


Family

by carmillasleatherpants (courtneyarnelle)



Series: Fill Me In [13]
Category: Carmilla (Web Series)
Genre: AU, Babies, Established Relationship, F/F, Mild Sexual Content, Mild Smut, Pregnancy, domestic hollstein
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-04-25
Updated: 2015-05-23
Packaged: 2018-02-28 19:59:36
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 10
Words: 27,765
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2745170
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/courtneyarnelle/pseuds/carmillasleatherpants
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>“Have you ever thought about having a baby?” The words are out of your mouth before you’ve really decided you’re going to say them, and then your mouth feels dry as your nerves get the better of you.</p><p>“Not particularly.” She finally responds. "Why?"</p><p>“I—Well,” It’s not entirely a bad thing to want, right?</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Beat

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> This one is still dedicated to you Nisha, for making me fall in love with the idea of Hollstein babies.

**“Have you ever thought** about having a baby?” The words are out of your mouth before you’ve really decided you’re going to say them. The question had been on your tongue for a little over a month and from what you could tell Carmilla didn’t seem to have any thoughts about the subject at all. You’d been working one exactly how you were going to say it. You were going to ease into it. You’d even practiced in the mirror.

Instead you’d spit out the question like vomit. And now having it out in the open exactly how you _didn’t_ want it to happen made the nervousness you’d been repressing feel like it was consuming you.

You’d been lying comfortably with Carmilla on the couch. Carmilla’s head was in your lap and you’d been running your fingers through her hair while she’d been stoking Fergie’s back. He’d made himself comfortable on her stomach and had been purring happily. Her hand had immediately stopped its rhythmic strokes along his spine at your question and you fear you’ve scared her. But having a child with Carmilla is something you’d been thinking about for a while. Maybe too long.

“Not particularly.” Carmilla finally responds and she scratches at Fergie’s scruff. You feel your heart constrict as you look from where her fingers play with Fergie’s scruff to your fingers tangled in Carmilla’s hair. “Why?”

“I—Well—” It’s not entirely a bad thing to want, right? You’ve been with Carmilla nine years now. You’d long ago dedicated your life to her. Not with a ring or marriage but with spoken promises. _And_ you were both twenty-six now. (You wouldn’t tell Carmilla this because she’d make fun of you, but you’d looked up online what a good age to have children was and mid-20s seemed to be the general consensus.)

You haven’t answered her yet and she tilts her head back to finally look at you with a single eyebrow raised in question.

“I want to have a baby.” You tell her. She goes still for a second, so you start to fear the worse. And you go with your first instinct to backtrack. “We don’t have to do it now I just—”

“Laura. You’re rambling.” You shut your mouth as she sits up. Fergie hisses in protest and hops off the couch. “Yes.”

“Excuse me?”

“Of course I want to have a kid with you. There’s no one else in the world I have the tolerance to raise a baby with.” You smile and run your fingers through her hair, then your hands rest on the back of her neck. It’s a really sweet statement in a _Carmilla_ kind of way. “I don’t exactly have the correct tools for baby making, but we can figure it out. Alright, cupcake?” You nod eagerly and she gives you a soft peck on the lips.

“Okay so now that I’ve finally gotten that out of the way. I have to ask, are you going to help me when the baby wakes up in the middle of the night?” Carmilla smiles and leans into your to press her face into the curve of your neck. You wrap an arm around her shoulders and she sighs.

“No promises,” is what finally leaves her mouth just when you’re starting to think she’s going to ignore your question altogether.

“Gee, thanks.” You say, but you’re smiling against the top of her head. “You’re lucky I like you.”

“Like?” She pulls away from you and fakes an offended look that you can’t help giggling at.

“Love.” You correct yourself. “You’re lucky I _love_ you.” Then she kisses you and your train of thought derails immediately. When she pulls away, her face is still close enough to yours that when you open your eyes you’re staring directly into hers.

“I wish you wouldn’t do that.” You tell her.

“What?” Her breath ghosts against your lips, and you lick your lips as you try to compose yourself.

“Kiss me when I’m trying to talk to you.”

“I want to kiss you while I can, cupcake. Your baby bump might get difficult to maneuver around.” You close your eyes and lean closer into her. Your hands move to her biceps to pull her closer to you. Carmilla’s hands move to press against the couch cushions on either side of your waist. Your legs wrap around her waist, making her hips settle between your legs and you rub the back of her thighs with your calves. Carmilla actually looks a little impressed.

“Well then, you better make the most out of the time you have now.” Then Carmilla’s kissing you hard. You ignore the initial discomfort of her teeth knocking against yours, instead cradling her face in your hands and kissing her back with just as much vigor.

Her hands find their way under your shirt. Your break your lips away from hers to let out a breath when her fingers waste no time moving underneath your bra to prod at your bare skin. And your bliss at Carmilla actually _wanting_ to have a baby with you is overshadowed only by Carmilla’s masterful manipulation of your body that has you gasping her name within minutes.

* * *

 

**Carmilla makes you an** appointment at a Fertility Clinic the next day. Carmilla had passed her BAR exam and gotten a job at a law firm. But since she was still new even after four months working there, she still got all the grunt work.

You know Carmilla enough to know she wanted to complain about her shitty job circumstances. But having a good amount of the small cases meant she got to come home early. You dread the moment when she’ll start getting big cases and she doesn’t start coming home until late at night.

The fact she could slack off enough at her job now to make you an appointment was almost a relief. You’d gone from a daily print to a weekly one a little after your leg had finished healing last year, and you were just getting home when familiar arms had wrapped around your waist.

And the first she tells you is that she made the appointment.

“Carmilla, really? What if I wanted to wait?” She presses a kiss to your cheek and you wrap your arms around hers.

“Since when have you ever been one for patience?”

She’s right of course.

* * *

 

**You spend the afternoon** researching with her on artificial insemination just so you’ll be informed on what you’re getting yourself into. Your head was spinning from all the new information floating around your head that you felt like you were going to explode. Carmilla ends up covering your mouth with her hand because you keep asking her questions she couldn’t possibly have the answers to while she’s trying to sleep.

Your appointment was two Saturdays later and had gone fairly quickly. They’d done some tests (you didn’t even attempt to remember the names of) and they’d asked you to come back for the next two or three months so they could monitor your ovulation and hormones.

Carmilla had sat in the waiting room while the tests were being done and you’re sure you did an awful job explaining everything to her. She’d just nodded and took your hand. And she offered to buy you ice cream which you’d been more than happy to agree to.

The two of you spend the next couple months on your off time looking into sperm donors. Looking for someone who shared similar features to Carmilla proved to be quite the task because you’re admittedly being picky.

“This one looks kind of like me.” Carmilla points to a man from Quebec who admittedly looks almost like they were twins lost at birth. You scan over his personal information but shake your head.

“No.” You protest. “He doesn’t have that cute, long angular nose you have.” Shegives you a look that’s between embarrassed and annoyed at your scrutiny of her face.

“We’re never going to pick a sperm donor at this rate.” She slouches into her seat and picks at her nails. Clearly giving up for the day. You rest your forehead against the table and sigh. You know you won’t find a man who looks _exactly_ like Carmilla. And the man you were looking at now shared more features than you were likely to find on anyone else.

“Fine. Let me look at him again.”

* * *

 

**Talking about your IUI** makes you uncomfortable, so you don’t talk about it. There were a lot of things the doctor explained to you that you don’t want to remember. The third time you’d gone back to the fertility clinic and they’d determined you had a very high chance of getting pregnant through something called “Intrauterine Insemination.”

Which, to dumb it down, just meant the entire process would be done by a doctor rather than you and Carmilla. You decide with Carmilla’s quick agreement that you’d prefer it be done by a doctor since they were professionals. And you’d gotten it done, details forgotten by choice.

You’d been told to wait about two weeks before testing to see if the operation had worked. And you’ve been a nervous wreck. Carmilla did her best to keep you calm, reminding you stress wouldn’t help you conceive. But you just couldn’t help it.

She rubs your back as you wait for the timers to run down on your phones so you can check the three pregnancy tests that are now sitting in your bathroom sink. You gripped her other hand tightly, and she continues to rub circles into the small of your back. You leaninto her touch and she pressesa kiss to your shoulder.

“Stop worrying. It’s going to be fine, cupcake.”

“Promise?”

“Yeah, I do.” You look at her and her mouth quirks into a half smile. “You know I don’t back out of promises, right?”

“Yeah. Don’t let this be the first.” She laughs and you get the urge to kiss her, but the moment is cut short by the timer on her phone going off. Yours goes of a split second later and you share a look. You want to melt into the tile beneath you so you nudge Carmilla. “You do it.”

Carmilla decides not to make fun of you for once. She moves away from you to check on the tests and you don’t look at her until she says your name and beckons you over. Her hand is held for you to take.

You take a breath before you link your hands and stand to look down at the tests.

They’re all positive.

You almost feel like fainting. You’re nervous and excited at the same time, and when you tell Carmilla this she hugs you. Your face presses into her firm shoulder and you wrap your arms around her. You were going to be _parents._

* * *

 

**You’d heard how horrible** morning sickness was, but you never expected it to suck _this_ much. A couple weeks later Carmilla is leaning against the sink next to you holding your hair back as you throw up what had been a pretty solid breakfast into the toilet.

You lean against the toilet seat and turn to her knowing you looked downright miserable. Carmilla gives you a sad smile and wipe your mouth with a towel.

“You might actually make a pretty good mommy, Carm. You’re doing a great job taking care of me.” You joke weakly. You can see her blushing and it makes you smile despite how _sick_ you feel.

“Stop talking, your breath smells.” She says and you flush.

“It’s not my fault!” You shoot back defensively and she just chuckles at you while you try to defend your puke breath to her.

* * *

 

**You’re lying in bed** with Carmilla, your face pressed into the crook of her neck. She’s holding you with one arm around your shoulders and the other rubbing your iffy stomach.

You’re complaining about how much pregnancy sucks and how you’ll never do it again when Carmilla presses her nose to the top of your head and hums in response to your complaints. When you’ve finished ranting, she finally speaks up.

“You’re the one who wanted to have a baby.”

“You’re actually the worst person ever.” She barks out a laugh. You wrap an arm around her stomach holding her tighter and Carmilla squeezes your shoulder.

“You don’t mean that.” Carmilla says and you sigh in defeat.

“No. No I don’t.”

* * *

 

**When you go in** for your first ultrasound at what you believe is ten weeks, you’re incredibly nervous. Carmilla’s hand hasn’t left yours since you walked inside per your request. But regardless of her presence you feel like your heart is going to beat right out of your chest.

“Laura.” Her voice breaks you from your thoughts about how many thing could be wrong. You look at her and the concern on her face makes you feel a little guilty.

“Sorry.” You murmur softly.

“No. You don't need to apologize. It’s fine.” She responds and she squeezes your hand. “I think it would be weird if you _weren’t_ nervous.”

You meet her eyes for a moment, then you lean in and give her a soft kiss.

“Thank you.” She smiles and kisses you again. Admittedly you feel a lot calmer than before.

* * *

 

**It’s not much longer** before the two of you are called back into one of the room. They ask you to lay down and lift up your shirt. And a cool jelly is spread on your stomach.

You’re not even showing yet so you’re skeptical about this whole thing working, but Carmilla assures you it will. Though she keeps asking the nurse questions about the process. You decide to ignore them, instead thinking of the baby now growing inside of you.

You’re told you might be able to hear the baby’s heartbeat today and you have no idea how to feel about that. You catch, from Carmilla’s questions, that the device being used on you is called a transducer. You don’t look, but you feel the device being moved around your stomach. You’re instead looking at the monitor and Carmilla is on your other side gripping your hand.

It takes a moment, but a grainy image appears on the screen and your breath hitches. After a little more movement you see it.

Your baby.

It's so tiny. Your grip on Carmilla’s hand tightens.

“That’s—That’s our—”

“I know.” She says. “I know.”

“Do you want to hear the heartbeat?” The nurse asks and you feel too choked up and weirdly emotional to speak, so you just nod fervently. She gives you a kind smile, before turning to grab another device.

Carmilla asks her questions again and you find out it’s called a 'Fetal Doppler.' The nurse uses the probe, and whatever it was that she’d rubbed on your stomach earlier, to search for the heartbeat of your baby.

Again it takes a moment. When you hear it, Carmilla grips your hand with both of hers and kisses your knuckles.

It’s fast but you’re told that’s normal. Hearing your baby’s heartbeat… Somehow makes everything feels like it’s going to be okay.

You squeeze Carmilla’s hand and mouth a thank you to her for staying by your side through all this. She only nods and closes her eyes. Just listening as the steady, fast paced beating of your baby’s heart fills the entire room.


	2. Bump

**It’s a full month** before your body starts to change. And it’s so gradual that you don’t notice it. Of course Carmilla does. It’s in the middle of an intimate moment with her when she’s kissing down your clothed chest to your stomach, when she stops and pauses. You don’t think anything of it until Carmilla withdraws almost completely and starts poking at your stomach.

“What are you doing?” You ask, pushing her hands away and trying not to be frustrated that she’d stopped just as things were getting good.

“Your stomach.” Carmilla tries to put her hands back on your stomach and you swat them away again.

“What about it?” You ask. Carmilla looks up to meet your eye for a split second, then she looks back at your stomach and narrows her eyes.

“It—Well, you’re showing a little bit.” You sit up onto your elbows and look at her with mild disbelief. Carmilla reaches for you again and raises her eyebrows as if asking if you’re going to swat her hands away again. You shake your head, then nod your consent. She takes one of your hands and rests it on your stomach. “You can feel it. It’s—they’re growing.”

And you _can_ feel it. You hadn’t really been paying much attention, but your stomach _is_ poking out a bit further than usual. It was strangely firm and you poke gently at your stomach.

“Carmilla.” She’s looking at your stomach with a look wonder. When you say her name, her eyes dart up to meet yours and she looks so innocent in this moment. You smile at her and twist a strand of her hair between your fingers.

“Hmm?” She presses a kiss right below where your shirt is bunched up beneath your chest.

“You’re so cute.” You tell her and she chuckles. Then she presses another kiss to your stomach before she rests her head on you and breathes a sigh.

“We can continue what we were doing before another time.” She says and you hum in agreement, playing with the hair on the nape of her neck and she presses into you. You feel like Carmilla has never been more affectionate and you can’t help the wide smile stretched onto your face.

* * *

 

 **“Shit.” Carmilla** **had looked** up immediately from where she was lounging on the bed at your language.

“Wow.” You look from where you’ve given up on trying to button your jeans to her. She has a single eyebrow raised in amusement and she flips the page of her book. “Must be bad if you’re cursing, buttercup.”

“My pants are too tight.” You admit and she blinks once. Then she drops her head and laughs. You put your hands on your hips and giveher a look of disapproval that actually makes her cough and force herself to stop when she meets your eyes again.

“I can’t lie and say I’m not enjoying the view, cupcake.” You feel like a child for the way your cheeks flush. “Tell you what, wear sweats for now and I’ll take you shopping later this week, yeah?”

“Okay.” She gives you a half smile and lays back down, and you pull your jeans down to change.

“Shame though. Your ass looked _really_ great in those jeans.”

You throw them at her in an effort to stop her flirting.

* * *

 

 **At eighteen weeks, you** and Carmilla go back to the clinic for another ultrasound. You’re sitting in the Family Planning Clinic, your head on her shoulder and your fingers laced with her. You find she’s still the perfect pillow and she turns her head to press a kiss to your temple.

“Carm—" You start, but you’re cut off by a nurse stepping out into the waiting room.

“Ms. Hollis?” She calls completely interrupting your question. You bite your lip and Carmilla asks you what you were about to say but you tell her you’ll tell her later. Then you stand and pull her after you to follow the nurse.

The room is becoming strangely familiar and you immediately lay down in the chair. You lift your shirt to allow the cool jelly to be spread onto your stomach by the physician. Carmilla stands beside you in silence, out of questions after visiting so many times to make sure everything is okay with your baby. She holds your hand as the transducer is moved around your stomach until the grainy image of your child appears in black and white on the screen.

You smile because they’ve grown. A bit bigger and definitely more developed.

“Wow.” You breathe.

“Would you like to know the sex of your baby?” Your eyebrows shoot up and you look at Carmilla then back to your physician.

“You can find that out so soon?” You say. At your excitement and confusion, she smiles and nods.

“Technology is amazing, isn’t it?” You share a conflicted look with Carmilla because you think this is really something you should talk about. “It’s up to you. I can step out and give the two of you some time to talk about it if you’d like.”

“If you wouldn’t mind.” You say. She smiles politely with a nod and sets the transducer down. The image of your baby disappears and she leaves. Once the door is shut behind her, you turn back to Carmilla.

“What do you want?” You ask. Carmilla looks down at your hand and strokes the back of your hand with her thumb.

“Honestly, either way doesn’t matter to me. But I want our child to be free to do what they want. I don’t want to push gender roles on them.”

“I don’t either! Which is why I was thinking maybe we don’t have to know, right?” She takes your hand and kisses your knuckles.

“That’s fine, cupcake.” The physician comes back in a few minutes later, you had changed to subject to her first actual case. It wasn’t for something exactly news worthy. Just a case of petty theft. You’d been teasingly trying to get details out of her. Carmilla looks like she might kiss you, but stops looking at your physician. Your physician looks almost embarrassed by of how close your faces had been. Carmilla backs away from you and actually manages not to look entirely displeased at the interruption.

“Have you decided?” She asks and you nod.

“We’ve decided we don’t want to know the sex.” She nods and looks at the two of you in turn before she replies.

“Well, you can always call back and ask if you change your mind.”

* * *

 

 **Shopping is nowhere near** as fun as you’d expected it to be. You find nearly all of the maternity clothes severely unattractive and you want resist the urge to scream.

“This isn’t about style. It’s about comfort and what’s going to fit. Stop complaining.”

“You knew this was going to suck.” You whine and she rolls her eyes at you.

“Laura, _honestly_.” You pout and she leaves the cart (that’s sadly near empty). Her hands find your elbows and pull you towards her. “Relax. You’ll only have to wear them for a little while. Why don’t you give some of these a chance, hm?”

You continue to pout at her, so she leans in and presses a kiss to your poked out lips. You sigh unable to stay angry with Carmilla trying so hard, so you release the tension from your shoulders.

“Fine.”

“Good. We can go wherever you want to eat later.”

“Promise?” Your lips curl into a smile and the corner of her mouth tilts upwards as she watches you.

“Fine. I promise. Now let’s get this done. I have better things to do.” The look she gives you is all the insinuation you need.

* * *

 

 **You and Carmilla (mostly** Carmilla because she _insisted_ that you helping would be harmful to the baby and you didn’t have the heart to try and argue with her) had cleared out the room you’d been using as storage to create a nursery for your baby.

You’d agreed to paint the room a warm spring green rather than the usual pinks and blues society dictated. Carmilla had gone out to buy the paint, leaving you staring at the white walls and feeling very useless.

You knew she was just trying to make sure you didn’t strain yourself, but you hated this feeling. You felt so useless. So when she came back you told her so. You’d agreed a while ago honesty was the best for your relationship, so if you were bothered by something you have no problem telling her.

“I’m sorry, I didn’t realize.”

“I understand that, just—If you’d let me _help—”_

“Well duh.” She cuts you off. “I’m not painting this entire room by myself, cutie.” You laugh and she wraps an arm around your waist. “There is way too much to get done for me to try to do this on my own. Understand?”

“Mhmm.” You hum and she presses a kiss to the bridge of your nose. You put your hands on your shoulders, and _God_ do you want to keep touching her. But Carmilla clearly has other plans.

“Good.” She looks at you for a moment and then she releases you. “Let’s get started.”

She lists off the things she was told as she bought all the paint supplies like she’s suddenly a painter’s encyclopedia. You ignore her and open one of the paint cans. Carmilla keeps talking as you work together to get it done. The two of you manage to get two entire walls done before both your "inner children" emerge.

She approaches you, seemingly to ask a question, and then she wipes a line of paint across your cheek. You gasp in surprise and she backs away from you, struggling not to laugh with her hands up in surrender.

“You wiped paint on me.” You exclaim and she snorts.

“It was just a prank.” She manages without laughing and you narrow your eyes at her.

“No. Nope, this means war. You can’t start and expect me not to retaliate.” You dip your hand into a can of the green pain and fling it at her. It splatters down her front from her collarbone to her hipand her mouth opens in surprise.

“I can’t believe you just did that.”

“Believe it.” Carmilla dips her hand into a half full bucket of paint and pulls it back out full of paint. “Carmilla. Carmilla no.” She approaches you slowly with a determined smirk and you start to back away. “Carmilla please. I’m your girlfriend. Your _pregnant_ girlfriend. Have mercy. _Carmilla!_ ”

Then she lunges at you and an all-out paint war ensues.

When it’s over, you’re both lying side by side. Her feet next to your head and vice versa, the both of you complete covered in splotches of spring green pain.

“I can’t believe we just did that.” Carmilla laughs.

“Oh come on. It was fun. Admit it, you had fun.”

“Okay, cupcake. I had fun.” She singsongs. She sits up and you smile at all the paint smeared down the side of face. The green looks surprisingly nice against her pale skin and dark hair, so you tell her so.

“You look hot in green.” You run your fingers through her hair. She smiles and kisses you. Your mouths move together with practice of countless kisses. Her chest presses against yours as you deepen the kiss, your breaths mingling together as your tongues meet.

It doesn’t take long for her hands to wander under your shirt, and you push hers off. God, she’s beautiful. She’s so, so beautiful. You feel so lucky to have her and you pull her into another kiss. Her lips move from yours to kiss along your neck until she finds your pounding pulse point and she suckles on your skin.

You moan under her touch and slide your hands under her bra. You roll her nipples in your fingers and she moans against your neck. The noise reverberates against your skin and then you feel her bite you hard.

Oh _that_ one was going to leave a mark.

You were going to pay her back for that one.

* * *

 

 **It’s a few days** later, when the paint has finished drying, when you decide to buy a crib from Ikea. The instructions are harder than you imagined. It feel like hours that you and Carmilla sit frustrated among a pile of parts.

“Call your dad.” She tells you eventually and you shake your head.

“No, we can’t call him every time we have a building issue. We can figure this out.”

“Cupcake, please call your dad. We’ll be here for hours.”

“Carm.”

“Laura.”

“But—”

“Now’s not the time for you to be getting stubborn. _Please_ call your dad.”

Carmilla eventually convinces you to call your dad despite your protests, which is probably a good idea in retrospect. He make it in under an hour and as much as you pretend not to you’d really missed him. Even though you’d just seen him a few weeks ago on Christmas. You really love your dad.

You give him a hug after Carmilla lets him inside and he kisses the top of your head. He gives Carmilla an awkward hug that she returns as best she can. Then you lead him to the nursery and the pile of parts to the crib.

He looks at the pile and he laughs. You're slightly embarrassed but Carmilla just looks disinterested.

You all settle onto the floor and start to actually get the crib together. Carmilla and your dad doing most of the work and you handing them whatever they ask for. You don’t mean to fall asleep, but you wake up in your bed sometime later.

You groan in slight aggravation at yourself for falling asleep, then you get up from the bed and go to return to help. However, you stop hearing a seemingly serious conversation between the two of them.

“—sorry again.”

“Mr. Hollis... It’s fine.” Carmilla sighs. From what you can tell, they’ve finished the crib and they’re standing back admiring it, which leads you to wonder briefly how long you’d been asleep.

“You still call me ‘Mr. Hollis.’ Like I’m not practically your father in law.” He points out and Carmilla doesn’t respond to that. “Look I know I didn’t treat you fairly and that I didn’t really give you a chance. And it’s clear to me how happy you make my daughter. I just can’t apologize enough for the way I treated you—”

“Hey. If I caught my teenage daughter making out with some strange girl on my couch I’d be pissed off too. Trust me, its fine. You don’t need to keep apologizing. It’s just making me feel awkward about something that happened _years_ ago.” Your father seems to be stunted by this admission and Carmilla lets out a short laugh. “Can we put this behind us now and be a family? Since, my mother died, you’re kind of the only grandparent this kid’s gonna have. We can’t have you tiptoeing around us, right?”

Your father manages a short laugh and he claps Carmilla on the shoulder, eliciting an ‘ _oof’_ from her. Your dad seems to have forgotten that Carmilla is only slightly taller than you and he’s really a big guy. So you decide it’s time to wander back in and pretend you haven’t heard a thing.

“Why didn’t you guys just wake me up?” You say, in your best _‘I-just-woke-up-and-I’m-needy’_ voice.

“Because you need your sleep, cupcake.” Carmilla holds out her hand to you, and you take her hand in both of yours. She pulls you against her and presses her nose against the side of your head.

“How long were you listening?” She whispers, and you hug her around her waist. You turn your head to whisper back to her.

“Long enough.” You admit and she laughs. Your father has already turned his attention from the two of you cuddling up to check to make sure the crib is sturdy.

“Well girls, if you need help building anything else just give me a call, yeah?”

“Sure.” Carmilla tells him and you nod in agreement. “We’ll see you for the baby shower in a few months, right?”

“Wouldn’t miss it.” He replies. Carmilla walks him out of the flat while you admire the new paintjob and the crib in the middle of the room. You can imagine this room decorated for your baby and playing with them in here and you get the feeling nostalgia brings. When Carmilla returns, she throws an arm over your shoulders.

“What were you thinking about?” You shrug.

“Nothing really.” Then you bump your hip against hers. “How long had you been planning out that little speech?” Carmilla looks bashful and she scratches at her nose.

“Ahh, not too long really. He’s apologized for the whole thing every time we’ve seen him since we moved in together. I just wanted the apologies to stop.”

“You’re really a big softie, aren’t you?” You snicker.

“Do you ever stop talking?” She sounds annoyed but she’s smiling at you. You press a kiss to her jawline.

“Only if you make me.” That makes a smirk pull onto Carmilla’s face.

"Maybe I will."


	3. Birth

**Of all the things** you’ve made Carmilla put up with in your life, this was probably the one you felt the worst about. Your cravings hadn’t started getting serious until just after the crib incident. You keep waking up in the middle of the night with the strangest _need_ for food.

It felt like if you didn’t get what you wanted then and there, you were going to _die_. You know logically it’s all in your head but you are much needier than you’ve ever been. And you feel horrible about it but you can’t help but continue to do it night after night.

You wake one night with Carmilla lying face down next to you. Her arm thrown over your torso while you sleep on your back because, unfortunately, spooning had to be set aside with your bulge making it flat out uncomfortable.

“Carm.” You whisper-yell. You nudge her leg with a toe. One of her eyes shoots open and she glares at you, then turns her head to the opposite side and ignores you. You scrunch your face up and repeat her name louder and push her a bit more forcefully. She groans loudly and sits up, glaring at you like you’ve stabbed her.

“What?” She hisses.

“I need pickles and cheese dip.”

“We have some downstairs.”

“No. I need it fresh.” Carmilla scoffs and tries to lay back down. You shove her arm from around you and nudge her until she sits back up. And she looks at you downright murderously.

“Seriously? I’m trying to sleep.” You pout at her and feel tears starting to fill your eyes. The anger on her face turns to a look of flat out annoyance.

“I just—I _need_ them. And I need you to get them for me. I thought you _loved_ me. Why won’t you—”

“Dear, _God_. Will you stop crying if I go?”

“I—” Sniffle. “Yes.”

You know this is absolutely pathetic. Faking tears just to get her to do what you want. And, although Carmilla never called you out for it, you’re sure she was getting tired of these two am runs to the market to sedate your cravings and stop you from whining. Your cravings had gotten to a schedule and you aren’t entirely sure how normal that is, but it was a thing.

In the mornings you always needed a warm glass of tomato juice. During the week when you had to go to work you take it in a thermos. On the weekends Carmilla would avoid you while you drank it if she was around. The one time you’d asked her why, she said it was ‘ _disgusting’_ and you’d tried not to be mad at her for it.

In the afternoon, you’d chew on ice cubes and that drove Carmilla crazy. You know it does because she’d grit her teeth and leave the room, but she doesn’t say anything until a slow Sunday afternoon when you’re lying on the couch with her. You have a cup full of ice in your hand and she groans loudly.

“Being pregnant is turning you mad.” She mumbles under her breath.

“Really? How are you going to handle a mad girlfriend and a baby all on your own?” You ask. Carmilla crosses her arms but a smile pulls onto her lips.

“I guess I’ll have to figure it out. You won’t be getting rid of me that easily.” And that earns her a kiss. You lean in with a hand pressed against her thigh to hold yourself up, and you give her a chaste kiss on the lips.

“You’re just saying that to get in my pants.” You whisper against her lips. Carmilla laughs and pulls away from you.

“Please. I don’t need to flatter you to get in your pants.” She twists a strand of your hair between her fingers. Her hand settles on your shoulder and pulls you into her until her nose presses to your hairline. You don’t move until she kisses your forehead, then moves her hand to slip under your shirt and rest on your growing stomach bulge.

And then you feel it. You jump because, at first, you’re unsure what it is. It feels like… like what you would imagine popcorn popping feels like but in your stomach. Carmilla moves away from you as you jump and stare at your stomach.

“What is it?” She asks. She follows your gaze to your stomach and then looks back to your face with her expression screwed into something of confusion. “Is something—”

“No. It’s nothing I guess. I just thought— Ahh.” No, you _definitely_ felt it that time. “Carm, I think— I think the baby’s kicking.”

She sits up straight and feels around your stomach carefully. It takes a moment, but her eyebrows raise when you feel that popping sensation and you _know_ she felt it too.

“Well _that_ was a kick.” You raise your hands to grip her elbows.

“I’m not just imagining it, right? You _did_ feel it?”

“Yes, cupcake.” And her wide smile is contagious. “I feel it too.”

* * *

 

 **The next few months** are uneventful. Your stomach grows. And Carmilla becomes more conscientious of her actions and everyone else’s when she’s around you.

God, she’s like a protective mother bear. (Or maybe an angry panther would be more accurate.) When the two of you go out in public she acts like your security guard. She practically snarls if anyone gets too close to you and she’s always touching you in some way. As much as you try and stop her, it seems she just can’t help it.

It’s cute in a way but it’s mostly annoying. You aren’t dying, you're just pregnant.

Although you _d_ _id_ like when shecarried you that one time when you complained about your feet hurting. She’d swept you right off your feet without a word and carried you bridal style back to your car to give your feet a break from the extra weight. The two of you had gotten looks that varied from impressed to annoyed, but you ignored them.

You’d always known Carmilla was really a big softie and this entire experience was just reinforcing that knowledge.

* * *

 

 **At around six months** once the nursery is nearly all put together you and Carmilla decide to have your baby shower. You invite everyone you’d been friends with in college. You had your get-togethers with them, but you hadn’t seen them since the summer before you’d gotten pregnant. You talked to Perry and Lafontaine bi-weekly. Danny and Kirsch a little less often.

Perry and Lafontaine had adopted a now three year old who went by JP. Danny and Kirsch had just had a daughter named Leila a couple months ago. From what you’d heard from Danny, Leila was needy and her sleep schedule was fucked. But she loved her daughter, you could hear it every time she talked about her. Sometimes it was hard to believe you’d all been stupid kids in college together when you’re all starting your own families.

You’ve kept in touch with your old roommate Betty and invited her too. It turns out it is a small world after all, because she shows up with one of Carmilla’s old roommates named Elsie. A couple more of your friends from work show up, as well a couple of Carmilla’s lawyer friends. Perry ends up questioning them for throughout the afternoon on different legal issues to the point they try to avoid her.

You’d hoped that after all these years, Danny and Carmilla would maybe finally warm up to each other. But you’re not blind to the tension that runs through the air when Danny approaches you halfway through the party. You ask Carmilla to get you a drink which she does immediately and you breathe a sigh of relief.

“Can’t you two _try_ and get along?” You ask Danny once Carmilla’s out of hearing range.

“Don’t act like it’s all _my_ fault, Laura.” Danny’s arms cross over her chest defensively.

“I know it’s just—”

“Look, I’ll try and be cordial. Okay? No promises.” You see Carmilla returning to where the two of you are standing, so you mouth a thank you to her. Carmilla wraps a possessive arm around your waist. She presses a cup into your hand and you take a sip with an exaggerated ‘ _mmm_.’

Danny stands awkwardly in front of the two of you and you glare at her. Her clear discomfort changes to confusion and you incline your head towards Carmilla. Danny, thankfully, catches your drift and clears her throat.

“So, Carmilla, how is being a lawyer? Never thought you’d be one for fighting for justice and all that.”

“Well, _Danielle_ , I found my options limited with the degree I’d chosen and this path seemed the least boring.”

“Were you right?” Danny actually looks kind of interested. You sense the makings of a conversation and decide to excuse yourself.

“I’m going to go find Lafontaine.” You say. Carmilla lets go of you and kisses your knuckles before you leave. You try not to roll your eyes because Carmilla is disgustingly affectionate. You find Lafontaine and stand with them.

“Where’s your body guard?” They ask.

“Who Carmilla?” You’re too busy trying to keep an eye on Carmilla and Danny to spare them more than a glance.

“L, what are you doing?” They follow you gaze. You look back at Lafontaine and see them looking at Carmilla and Danny with a shocked expression. “Um are they—”

“ _They’re bonding_. _”_ You whisper gleefully. As if on cue they laugh at something Danny says and you grip your cup so hard it crumples in your hands.

“You are a _genius_.” Lafontaine pats you on the back. And not having to worry about the two of them biting each other’s heads off the rest of the night is a weight off your back.

* * *

 

 **“What do you think** would be a good name for the baby?” Carmilla had just finished a case and had her third consecutive win. So when she’d asked for a day off, no one complained. You’re lying in your bed with your head in her lap. One of her hands rests on your stomach and the other plays with your hair.

At your question she hums in thought.

“It has to be gender fluid.” She finally says.

“Of course.” You reply. You take her hand that’s on your stomach and lace your fingers with hers. Carmilla squeezes your hand and she runs her fingers through your hair pushing it back.

“Pick a name that starts with J.” It catches you off guard. So you spit out the first thing that comes to mind.

“James.”

“That’s not exactly gender fluid, sweetheart.”

“Er— Jamie?”

“Jamie.” She repeats. You like the way it sounds coming from her so you sit up and turn to look at her. Carmilla’s hand drops from your hair to her lap.

“Do you like Jamie?”

“I do like Jamie.” She moves her hand to rub her chin. “Do _you_ like Jamie?”

“I do.” You answer. Carmilla smiles and presses a kiss to your knuckles. “Then Jamie it is.”

* * *

 

 **As much as you’d** tried to avoid it, Carmilla thought it was best for you to attend childbirth classes. Her reasoning being that both of you were inexperienced in the whole process and she wanted to be as informed as possible. Plus she insisted you couldn’t always trust the internet to teach you everything you wanted to know. (Though you’re pretty sure the internet is a really good source for quick information.) And she couldn’t really go without you with her, as that would kind of defeat the purpose, so you reluctantly agree to go with her.

Although the local hospital had suggested a class they offered, the two of you decide to go to a place Danny suggests instead. The class has five other women in it who Carmilla prevents you from talking to for whatever reason. You all sit comfortably on padded mats in a semi-circle around a white board. The other women, in various stages of pregnancy, all sit around chatting.

The class starts with you all introducing yourselves and you get a side glance from one women when she looks at you and Carmilla’s joined hands. Carmilla notices around the same time you do and wraps an arm around your waist. She presses a kiss to your temple and the woman looks horrified. She pointedly looks away from you both.

You give Carmilla a bubbly smile that she returns, and then you both give the instructor your, mostly, undivided attention. The class is scheduled to last an hour and the first half hour is all lecture. You attentively listen as the woman, who’d introduced herself as Sara, talks about signs of labor.

“If this is your first pregnancy, you might feel more weight in your pelvis and notice less pressure against your ribs. This is known as your baby ‘dropping.’” You unconsciously place a hand on your ribs as much as you can over your bump and Carmilla’s hands covers yours.

You glance up at her, but she’s not looking at you. So you definitely _don’t_ pout as you turn your eyes back to your instructor as she goes over a few more signs that make you a bit queasy. You’re worried about how much the contractions are going to hurt. When you tell Carmilla this she presses her nose to the side of your head.

“Don’t worry. I’ll be right by your side the entire time.” She promises.

Carmilla doesn’t move from that position the rest of the verbal instruction part of the class. You feel half embarrassed, but as always you’re warmed by how affectionate she is. You’re interrupted from your public love fest by Sara moving on from her vocal lesson.

“Now I’ll show you how to properly sit up as not to discomfort your baby by putting pressure on it. If you and your partner would move so that you’re laying down…”

* * *

 

 **You really miss not** being pregnant.

“This is the worst idea I’ve ever had.” You moan. Carmilla is sitting in the small room you’d dedicated to be her study on her laptop with papers strewn around her as she works on… Something.  When you’d asked her what ‘ _something’_ was, she wouldn’t give you a straight answer. You figure that means it’s a serious case. So you’d plopped down on the couch and laid down on your back.

You were huge. Your feet hurt. You were definitely started to feel a bit more pressure on your pelvis as you’d learned a couple months ago.

“Do you ever stop complaining?” Carmilla replies with absolutely no sympathy. So maybe you’ve asked for one too many foot rubs and lost her affection for today.

“Carm.” You say, as less needy as you can, and she sighs.

“Look, I just—I need to get this done and then I can come and cuddle with you or whatever you want.”

“There’s… There’s no rush.” You say feeling guilty. You pull one of the yellow couch pillows to your chest and press you nose into it.

“I—Okay. I’ll be with you as soon as I’m done. Just give me a bit.”

“Yeah. Yeah no problem.” This was a lot easier that first year. Back in high school before university had separated you during the week. Before you’d had to both become adults and had _actual_ responsibilities. Before you’d had bills to pay. Before you’d _had_ to trade your time and labor for paper bills called money.

You bury your face deeper into the pillow and fall asleep with troubled thoughts.

* * *

 

 **You wake sometime later** and jump seeing Carmilla’s face _right_ in front of yours. Your hand flies to your chest over your racing heartbeat.

“Jesus! You can’t do that. You could scare me into labor.”

“Please that’s a myth.” She tells you and you purse your lips. Carmilla is kneeling beside you and the pillow is still held tight against your side. She smiles when you glare at her.

“Have I ever told you how cute you are when you’re irritated with me? Your face gets all scrunched up.”

“Flattery will get you nowhere.” You mumble. She sighs and sits down beside the couch. You try not to notice she’s stripped down to a white tank top and black panties. (Which clearly you’ve noticed.)

“How are you feeling?” She moves on and you roll onto your side and push up with your arms to sit yourself up, just as you’d been instructed by Sara the Pregnancy Expert.

“I’m okay.” You decide after a moment and Carmilla slides up onto the couch to sit down next to you.

“Okay.” She replies. After a silent moment, you rest your forehead on her shoulder. Carmilla wraps her arm around your shoulders. “I know I’ve been… distant again. I’m sorry.”

“Don’t apologize.” You tell her. You rest a hand against her thigh and look up at her. Her lips are pressed into a thin line and her eyebrows are scrunched together. You lean in to kiss her because you know it’s the only sure fire way to make her relax, and thankfully she does. “I know this job is really important to you. And I know you don’t want to us to live off your inheritance. I get that you want us to be living independent from that and I think that’s beautiful. So you don’t have to apologize. For anything. Okay?”

Carmilla watches you for a moment once you’re finished talking. Then her fingers tangle in your hair and she leans down to kiss you again. Her lips feel like a lot of different things, but she tells you the one that you feel the strongest.

“I’m so in love with you.” She breathes. You let out a short laugh and press another kiss to the corner of her mouth giddily. The sincerity in her voice sends a wave a warmth through you and you press your forehead against hers.

“Even after nine years?” You don’t mean it as a real question, and she thankfully catches that.

“I don’t see how anyone could fall _out_ of love with you, Laura Hollis.” Her saying (almost) your full name reminds you of something you'd meant to talk to her about before now.

“Do you think we can get our names hyphenated? I think Jamie Hollis-Karnstein sounds a lot better than just one or the other.”

“A bit of a mouthful, cupcake.”

“I don’t care. I want Jamie to have both of our last names.” Carmilla hums a laugh and then she pulls away from you.

“Fine. I don’t have a problem with that.” She stands and holds out a hand for you. “I know you aren’t aware, but it’s three am and I’d like to go to bed now.”

“Oh! Why didn’t you tell me?” You exclaim. You take her hands to get to your feet. Then you slap her shoulder lightly.

“You looked so peaceful in your sleep, sweetheart.” She admits and you can’t _really_ be mad at her.

* * *

 

 **You’re definitely not having** another baby.

You’d been having a lunch with Carmilla. A _really_ nice lunch with Carmilla. It had been a couple months since she’d had a day off. There is something really relaxing about eating with your hand resting in Carmilla’s lap and her arm around your waist.

And then you notice, well, the growing puddle between your legs? You blush at first thinking you’ve now lost control of your bladder thanks to the growing _person_ in your abdomen. Then you realize—

“Carm.”

“Hm?”

“I think my water broke?”

“What?”

“My—Um—It’s—”

“For fuck’s sake, Laura.” She stands up quickly and starts rushing around grabbing the car keys and shoving a coat in your arms. You haven’t moved an inch from your seat and she glares at you. “What are you doing?”

“I’ve just—I’ve never seen you this flustered.”

“ _Not_ the time, cupcake.”

* * *

 

 **It had been enjoyable** for about five minutes watching her panic. Then while Carmilla was driving you to the hospital your first contraction hits. You put a hand on your stomach and gasp. It wasn’t that bad honestly. They were few and far in-between. A little discomforting but not that painful.

But with you going to the hospital with your contractions coming with such long gaps between them, it had been… A long Wednesday afternoon.

And night.

And morning.

A long… 28 hours.

Your doctors had to wait until your cervix had fully dilated to the standard seven centimeters before they even really started to do _anything._ Like Carmilla had promised, she hadn’t left your side. There were dark circles under her eyes because every time she was about to drift off to sleep, another contraction would hit and you’d resist the urge to moan in pain. You couldn’t completely muffle yourself and after a while you’d stopped trying. Each time you make a noise, she jerks to attention and her hand squeezes yours comfortingly.

Honestly you do have to resists the urge to punch her in the face a few times for letting you do this to yourself. But she looks so concerned you _have_ to ignore that small urge.

And when it comes time for you to start pushing, Carmilla lets you squeeze the life out of her hand. God did the drugs really help with the pain. They hadn’t let you have any until you were closer to 10 cm which Carmilla almost tore their heads off for.

The entire process leaves you completely worn out. But the cries of your child fill the room and everything is so suddenly completely worth it. Carmilla keeps hold of your now weak grip and presses a kiss to your knuckles. Youvaguely hear someone announce that ‘ _it’s a boy!_ ’

“You look beautiful.” You tell Carmilla, feeling high and light. And she does. Somehow she always manages to look flawless. Even with dark circles under her eyes, her make up untouched in the time she’d been here and still wearing the clothes she’d had on yesterday. You reach up towards her with your free hand. She takes it and rests it on her cheek.

“You did amazing.” She says and you smile.

It takes a few minutes before you’re asked if you want to hold him. You nod, finding your throat too dry to keep trying to speak. They're warm in your arms. New and still a little bloody but so, so warm.

Carmilla strokes a finger along their cheek and their lips curl into the smallest of smiles. Carmilla’s grip on your hand tightens and you squeeze her hand back.

“Jamie.” You say and they wiggle a bit in your arms. “So you like your name, huh? It was kind of random, but it stuck with us. I was hoping you’d like it too.”

You look up at Carmilla and she’s grinning down at the both of you.

And you know you couldn’t have picked a better family than this one if you tried.

* * *

 

 **On May ninth at** 6:39 pm, Jamie Alexander Hollis-Karnstein was born. Although you and Carmilla aren’t married, they allowed Carmilla to sign the birth certificate after your father came and ensured you two were very serious. That gave Carmilla legal rights over Jamie and ensuring her the ability to make decisions in their life. You’re let out of the hospital within a few hours and allowed to take your baby home.

Laying your baby down in their crib for the first time is a feeling you’d be happy to relive again and again. And the wide smile on Carmilla’s face is something you’ll never, ever forget.


	4. Growth

**Your first week home** with Jamie is a blur of breastfeeding and dirty diapers. Carmilla really likes to play with them. It’s really cute watching her coo at them and tease them with toys until a giggle spills from their lips. But at the sign of messy diapers she always suddenly disappears. You don’t necessarily blame her (She’s never really cleaned anything to begin with), but you do resent the fact that she refuses to help you change Jamie’s diapers most of the time.

But she did give you a break at night. For the moment, you’ve both decided to keep Jamie’s crib in your room so you wouldn’t have to run back and forth whenever they needed something. When Jamie wails in the middle of the night, Carmilla gets up without a word and lifts Jamie into her arms. Every now and then you can’t fall back asleep, so you watch her pat Jamie’s back and feed them with the milk collected from your breast pump until they drift back to sleep.

It has been somewhat surprising watching how easily Carmilla has embraced motherhood. She handles Jamie gently and patiently, even during those few times they screamed no matter what she did. In those moments, Carmilla just shushes them as gently as she can and presses soft kisses to their head as she leaves the room to allow you to get some sleep.

But most of the time Carmilla would scoop Jamie into her arms and Jamie would coo at her in delight. She’d twirl slowly around with them until they fell back asleep and she’d lay them back down in their crib. Then she’d crawl back into bed next to you and press her face into your shoulder.

If you were still awake at that point, you’d tangle your fingers in her hair and hold her against you. And you’d relish in the soft sound of her drifting back to sleep and the gentle breathing of your baby in the crib a couple feet from your bed.

* * *

 

 **You miss work, but** you really didn’t think it was in any way a good idea to be away from Jamie for any unspecified amount of time in an attempt to keep up with work, even if you were working from home. So you make the decision to completely quit your job despite your previous plans. Your bosses at the paper had been understanding but let you know you’d be missed. You had discussed your decision with Carmilla before you quit. And she’d told you she would support any decision you made. And you know she’d always support you but hearing it directly from her was always a good feeling.

You tell her one night when she’s home playing with Jamie that you think you might want to try and go on the local news once Jamie’s old enough that you’re comfortable sending them to daycare. Carmilla is lying on her stomach entertaining Jamie while they’re lying on their stomach across from her. Tummy time definitely wasn’t Jamie’s favorite thing in the world, but you’d learned it was necessary for muscle development during your birthing classes.

So when it came time for this daily exercise you’d lie on the ground with them. Though if Carmilla was home, she’d take over that task for you.

“Jamie’s going to be a little celebrity with their mommy on TV.” Carmilla says. You watch her cover her eyes and then uncover them quickly. Jamie watches her with wide eyes and drool dribbling from the side of their mouth. Carmilla’s surprisingly really, really amazing with Jamie. Fergie sits beside the two of them, regarding Jamie with mild curiosity.

“There’s no guarantee they’ll hire me though, Carm.” She puffs out her cheeks and blows raspberries at Jamie. They grin in delight and Fergie tilts his head at Carmilla as if she’s a stranger. If she notices, she ignores him, instead responding to you.

“Please. You’re cute and—”

“Cute?” She rolls her eyes at your interruption and clear fishing for compliments.

“ _Gorgeous_.” She corrects herself. “And they’d be stupid not to hire you as a _potential_ regular news anchor. You’d just be starting out. Not to mention you have some experience.” Jamie yawns. She stops her encouraging words to sit up and lift them into her arms. Fergie abandons his spot lying next to them as she moves and pads elsewhere.

“Thanks.” You tell her honestly. She stands and walks towards you. You hold open your arms and Carmilla places Jamie carefully into your arms.

“That would mean naptime.” She says, referring to Jamie’s yawn.

“Sure does.” You agree as you turning to take Jamie to their crib.

* * *

 

 **Jamie starts to** **mimic** sounds you make at around three months and he protests a little less about tummy time. Afternoon walks had become a thing that you and Jamie did since Carmilla was at work so much. She’d join you if she was home. (You try and ignore how often the ‘ _if she was home_ ’ affects her interactions with you and Jamie because that’s not something she can really help.)

What you really love though is how Jamie looks at the world with wide brown eyes filled with wonder and curiosity. Honestly it made you kind of emotional watching them grow bigger and adjusting to the world around them. Jamie is also very grabby. They grab at your fingers and would occasionally bring them to their mouth to suck on them like a new toy.

It’s nearly two months after Jamie is born when Carmilla tells you she feels like she’s missing out on so much because she had to work. You promise her she was only missing a gigantic load of diapers. (Which is entirely true.) Still she feels she’s missing out on a lot of time with Jamie. So when she comes home early as a surprise one night, you hand them off to her and leave to make dinner. (Yes, you’re cooking now. Carmilla had mostly weaned you off your sugary diet and gotten you to eat “real” food.)

When you return to your room to tell her dinner is ready, you find her cuddled up with Jamie. Both of them asleep. Carmilla has both arms around Jamie, and Jamie has their head laid against her breast. Carmilla has the most content look on her face. One you hadn’t seen for a while. (Aside from your more intimate moments with her but those really don’t count.) Jamie’s hand is fisted in the lapel of her blazer. (She’d complain about that later.)

You lean against the doorframe and take another moment to just watch them sleep. You love them. You love them so much. Every time the family you’ve somehow managed to find yourself a part of is laid in front of you like this, your heart swells a little bit. You don’t have the heart to wake them so you find your phone and take a picture to document the moment. Then you slide into bed with them and leave dinner to warm up later.

* * *

 

 **You and Carmilla have** adjusted to accommodate raising Jamie quickly and taken to the responsibilities of raising a child in stride. It is a bit hard not having Carmilla around sometimes, but it’s never bad enough to be a serious problem for you. But Jamie definitely loves having both of you around them though.

You use blocks to help teach Jamie to hold things and they become even grabbier if possible. They grab at your hair, your clothes and your face. They’ve accidentally punched you more than once, but not with enough force to be too damaging.

And bathing Jamie has probably become your favorite thing to do. It’s weirdly intimate. Gently scrubbing their skin and listening to them giggle as they play with the bubbles and splash a bit in the water.

They’re starting to recognize the word ‘no’ better. It kills you sometimes to have to reprimand them, but there’s only so much hair pulling you can take.

It’s at around six months when Jamie turns tummy time into a time to roll around on the floor, or bed, or wherever you laid them down. So you have to watch them a lot more carefully to make sure they don’t hurt themselves. Peekaboo has become their favorite game to play with Carmilla. Instead of just staring at her, Jamie would giggle and babble when she uncovered her face.

At eight months when they start to crawl, and Carmilla finds those baby barriers you’d made her help you put up very useful. Jamie really liked to explore the house once they’d figured out how to crawl around, and they tired themselves out quickly.

And you’d also made the transition from breast feeding to solid food.

Carmilla thought it was funny watching you feed Jamie because you open your mouth so that Jamie will mimic you. Then you spoon the baby food into their mouth. Jamie is a messy eater and ends each meal with food on their cheeks and chin. Carmilla wipes them up while you clean off their spoon.

Jamie babbles at you more. Even though you have no idea what they’re saying, they’re very talkative and you nod encouragingly at them. They’ve got the biggest gummy smile. They also have that same dark, curly hair Carmilla has but she tells you he has your wide brown eyes. (You _would_ argue you _both_ have brown eyes but Jamie also didn’t really carry Carmilla’s genes.)

“You’re sweet.” You tell her and she presses a kiss to your cheek before picking Jamie up.

“Mhmm.” Carmilla puts an arm under Jamie’s bottom to support them in her arms and her voice takes on that high pitched tone she has reserved just for them. “This one needs to take a nap. So  I’ll be right back.”

You hear Carmilla singing a lullaby to Jamie through the baby monitor and you move to the couch to rest while you wait for her. She returns after a few minutes and plops down on the couch next to you.

“Its bad manners to sit down on a couch like that.” You tell her and she rolls her eyes at you.

“Well it’s _my_ couch. So I’ll do what I want on it.” You huff but don’t have a real argument against that because she’s not wrong. Carmilla turns to look at you, then she leans into you as if she’s going to kiss you. Instead she presses her face into your shoulder and sighs. “You smell like a newborn.”

“Well what else am I supposed to smell like? I’m a housewife now.” You don’t mean to sound so saddened by it, but that’s how it comes out. To your displeasure but not at all surprise, Carmilla pulls away from you with a concerned look on her face.

“Is that how you feel?”

“No, it’s just…” You pause and look down at your hands nervously before you meet her eyes again. “Carmilla, I’m happy. Like I’m _really_ happy. I love Jamie so much. And I love taking care of them.” You pause and she slides her hands up from your ankles to your thighs. You’re slightly distracted by her touch and you lick your lips.

“But?” Carmilla pushes and you remember you’re having a conversation with her. You bite you lip trying to think of exactly what you want to say.

“But? I don’t know.” You bite your lip and Carmilla watches you patiently. “I just… I think I’d like a day off?”

“When?” She says immediately.

“When?”

“Tell me when. I’ll take off work and take care of everything.” You look at her in shock because you know she’s completely serious. You can’t help it, your eyes start to water. You cover your face with your hands. Since when had you become such an emotional mess? You feel like you don’t deserve her but you wouldn’t tell Carmilla that because she’d spend hours convincing you the exact opposite.

Carmilla worked her _ass_ off in her state job trying to rise in the ranks and get good cases so that she could provide for you and Jamie. And you feel absolutely useless. What was Carmilla getting out of this arrangement aside from a possible few gray hairs?

“You don’t need to do that.” You voice wavers with the tears building behind your eyes and you feel Carmilla’s hands rise to grip your shoulders. You shake your head. “I don’t have any room to complain. I mean you’re the one bringing home the bacon and I’m doing _nothing._ I just—”

“Laura.” You shut your mouth and Carmilla pulls your hands away from your eyes. Her lips press gently to yours and you can’t help but pull her back against you when she starts to pull away. Carmilla moves her lips with yours and she presses a kiss to the tip of your nose when you finally pull back to breathe. “Laura, I _want_ to. You deserve a break too, cupcake.”

Your lower lip quivers and you pour out everything that had just been on your mind. You tell her how bad you feel about her spending all the time working and that you feel like she’s getting the raw end of this deal. You tell her how unfair it feels to you that you get to stay home and raise your child while Carmilla works. Carmilla lets you vent your frustrations and when you finish her hand grips your shoulder reassuringly.

“Sorry.” You mumble. She shakes her head.

“Creampuff, if I didn’t want to do this I wouldn’t. I don’t mind working all the time because I know what I’m doing it for. I’m doing it for you and for Jamie. For us. For our _family_. And yeah I get tired sometimes and frustrated. I won’t pretend I don’t. But coming home and seeing you and Jamie and Fergie in _our_ home, it’s worth it to me. You don’t have to worry about me.”

“You know I always worry about you, Carmilla.” She kisses you then. It’s slow and lingering, and she pulls away with a small smile on her lips.

“I know. Me too.”

“I’m sorry for… For this.”

“You’ve always been kind of emotional.” That makes you laugh and you scoot so you’re laying down flat on the couch. Carmilla settles between your open legs and presses a kiss to the side of your neck. You hum appreciatively and you feel her smile against you at the sound.

 “I love you.” It comes out a little breathless and Carmilla sits up to look into your eyes before she answers you.

“I love you too.” And you know you does. You really do.

* * *

 

 **Jamie’s teeth come in** a little later than expected. So when you notice one of their bottom middle teeth starting to peek through the gums while you’re feeding them, you call Carmilla immediately.

Not so surprisingly, she picks up on the first ring thinking something is wrong and is halfway annoyed to find out it’s just Jamie’s teeth coming in.

“How can you _not_ be excited?” You ask, letting Jamie play with your free hand. They have a strange interest in your fingers and likes to stick them in their mouth. However with the tooth there and it digging into your skin at the moment, that might have to stop soon.

“You could have just shoved Jamie in my face when I got home or sent me a picture.” Despite her being rude over the phone you know she’s just as excited at you are. Even if she tried to hide it, you’ve known her long enough to hear that underlying excitement in her voice. You’d had a conversation with her about your worry about how long it was taking for the teeth to appear. But that wasn’t a problem anymore.

“Do you want a picture?” You ask her. It takes her an extra second before she answers, but she sighs.

“Yes.”

“Okay. I’ll send you a picture after I hang up. Bye, baby.”

“Bye cupcake.” The call ends and you take the phone away from your ear. When you smile at Jamie they follow your example. They give you a bubbly, one-toothed grin and you quickly snap a selfie with them and send it to Carmilla.

That night Carmilla tries to be slick about it, but you notice her deliberately keeping you from looking at her phone. You don’t think it’s anything serious. Regardless, when you get the chance you look and you’re elated to find the picture of you and Jamie is the lockscreen on her phone.


	5. Firsts

**It’s pretty convenient that** Carmilla is home when Jamie takes their first steps. Plus she’s the one to encourage them. Carmilla is sitting on the couch holding Jamie up with her hands beneath their armpits as they bounce on their legs. You watch from where you’re sitting on the floor as Carmilla babbles some nonsense at Jamie and they giggle at her. You honestly never thought you’d see the day where Carmilla was _babbling_.

But you suppose there’s a first for everything.

“Carm, can I?” You hold open your arms. Carmilla looks at you and nods before she leans down and says something to Jamie. They look at her with wide eyes.

“You can do it. You understand, right?” Then she turns Jamie around towards you and releases her hold on them.

“Carm, I don’t think—”

“ _Wait_. They’ve been trying for a while. Look.” They don’t move for a moment and she gives them a gentle nudge in your direction. You press your lips together but make a note to blame Carmilla if Jamie ends up hurt. However Jamie takes a wobbly first step towards you. It’s slow and awkward. Every time their step wavers you get the urge to lunge forward and grab Jamie them, but a look from Carmilla keeps you in place.

You take a breath to calm yourself and smile. You keep your arms outstretched encouragingly towards Jamie as they stumble towards you. They fall into your lap and you hug them to your chest.

When you look at Carmilla, her face reads _‘I-told-you-so’_ but her smile is one of pride. You roll your eyes at her and lean down to kiss the top of Jamie’s head instead of saying anything to her. They clearly don’t understand how far they’ve come because they’re just drooling on your shirt and trying to grab at your hair. When you pull Jamie away from you, you frown slightly at the dark mark on your shirt and move so Jamie’s sitting comfortably in your lap.

They smile at you. A few more of their teeth have grown in, leaving their grin gapped and goofy looking. You pick up their teething toy. Jamie shoves it into their mouth and noms on it. You wipe the drool from their mouth with their shirt as Carmilla stands. She walks towards you and ruffles your hair with a hand, effectively messing up it up. You reach up with one hand to swat her away, keeping the other firmly against Jamie’s waist.

Carmilla just laughs at the irritated look on your face. Despite her being annoying in this moment, you think for what must be the zillionth time that your life with Carmilla has to be the best thing that’s ever happened to you.

* * *

 

 **After those first few** steps, a large amount of confidence is instilled in Jamie. It isn’t long before they’re racing around your flat, picking up whatever is lying around and sticking it into their mouth. Or tossing it away from them and clapping at their accomplishment.

In other words, Jamie learning to walk has made them an even bigger handful. Carmilla had to become more conscientious about where she left things when Jamie started to crawl. But now that Jamie could move around a lot quicker on their feet, she was obsessively keeping anything she deemed choke worthy off the floor and out of Jamie’s reach.

Even though Carmilla could get annoying with her protectiveness, she didn’t take any chances with Jamie and you were grateful for it. Plus she got to watch you chase Jamie around now while she was working on things from the dining room table.

* * *

 

 **Carmilla is at work** when Jamie says their first words when they’re close to seventeen months. Jamie seems to enjoy holding their own sippy cup and drinking watered down juice, so you give that to them while you call Carmilla about your picnicking plans in a couple weeks. Carmilla isn’t all that happy about you calling her at work for something like this, but she is on a short lunch anyway and agrees to give you a bit of time.

Jamie slams their sippy cup down on the table of their highchair, effectively taking your attention from the phone and back to them. Carmilla quiets and you watch Jamie stick three fingers into their mouth and start mumbling around them.

“Are you—Are you trying to say something?”

“What’s going on?” Carmilla asks and you shush her.

“Mmm.” They nom on their finger and stare up at you with wide innocent eyes. You hear Carmilla call your name and you put her on speaker.

“Shhh. I think Jamie’s trying to say something.” You tell her, and she goes completely silent.

“Ma—Mm.”

“Ma? Mom?” You encourage and their mouth curls into a smile.

“Maarm.” It’s a clear combination of Mom and ‘Carm’ to you and you laugh. Jamie claps at your smile and knocks their sippy cup from their high chair.

“Did you hear that Carm?”

“Yeah. Yeah I did.” She’s quiet for a moment before her voice takes on that annoying teasing tone. “How often do you talk about me that half my name is the first full word they say?”

“What—Shut up. You always have to make everything not cute.” Carmilla laughs and Jamie, completely over the excitement at their first words, whines for their dropped sippy cup. You take Carmilla off speaker and reach down to retrieve the sippy cut and hand it back to Jamie. They babble happily and go back to draining their juice.

“So you’re not going to answer my question?” Carmilla asks and you can just hear her teasing smirk.

“No. We have a picnic to finish discussing. And I know for a fact you don’t have that long before you’re needed back in your office.” You comb your fingers through your hair and watch as Jamie mimics your movements by clumsily batting at their hair.

“Oh do you know that for a fact?”

“Yeah, I do.”

“Fine, creampuff. You sure do suck the fun out of _everything_.” You roll your eyes, then you remember that she can’t see you. So you tell her.

“I’m rolling my eyes.”

* * *

 

 **You introduce finger food** into Jamie’s diet later the next week in anticipation of your upcoming picnic trip. You cut up some grapes for them. You pick a piece up between your fingers and animatedly eat it. Jamie tilts their head at you and you demonstrate again.

“You think you can do that?” Jamie removes their fingers from their mouth and copies you. They struggle a bit at first, but manage to pick up a bit of grape between two fingers and stuff it into their mouth. You lean forward and wipe the excess drool from their mouth. They give you a grin with a mouth of mashed up grape buried in a puddle of drool in return.

The thought of how disgusted Carmilla would be at the sight of mashed up food in Jamie’s mouth makes you laugh.

* * *

 

 **A couple weeks later,** close to their first birthday, you take Jamie to the park with Carmilla. You’d spent the morning getting things together. Between making something for you and Carmilla and cutting up soft food for Jamie, it had proven to be a bit of a task. You’d let Carmilla sleep in despite her forcing you to agree to wake her up early to help.

You wake her when everything is packed and she groans in annoyance. She throws an arm over her eyes.

“I hate you,” is the first thing she says. You move her arm from over her face and press a kiss to the bridge of her nose.

“Carmilla, come on. I didn’t wake you up early like you asked because I knew you’d be like this, but it’s almost eleven and we still have to go visit my dad afterwards to talk about Jamie’s birthday party.”

“No.” She swats aimlessly at you. You grab her wrists and pin them above her head, moving to sit on top of her.

“Carmilla stop being a baby. I already have one of those to take care of.” She glares up at you with a pitiful pout on her face. She doesn’t strain against you and you move your hands down to dance along her stomach. She jerks underneath you and her hands fly upwards to grab your wrists.

“Don’t—”

“Aw what’s the matter, Carmilla?” You attempt to move your fingers again and she grips your wrists tighter.

“Laura, _don’t._ ” You snatch your hands away and start to tickle her. She bursts into laughter while attempting to swat your hands away. “ _Stop_. Laura, I swear to—Quit! _Quit_!”

* * *

 

 **The weather is absolutely** amazing. After tickling Carmilla until she agreed to get up and get dressed, you’d gotten Jamie ready and then walked with them to the park. You lay out a blanket on the grass while Carmilla lifts Jamie from their stroller and into her arms.

Carmilla sits with Jamie between her legs with an arm around their waist while you take out the food. And she lets Jamie feed themselves tiny bits of fruit and sit on watered down juice.

It’s not too exciting honestly, but it’s nice. It’s nice to just be with Carmilla and Jamie and not have anything to worry about. And when Carmilla smiles at you, you know she has the same content feeling you do.

* * *

 

 **You end up inviting** most of the same people who’d been to your baby shower to Jamie’s first birthday party. They don’t warm up to strangers at first, clinging to your shirt and shying away from everyone who says hi.

No one seems offended, they just laugh and move on to talk to your other guests. Jamie warms up to Danny and Kirsch’s daughter first. They babble at each other for a second before they settle down with some toys. You’ve made friends with a few other new mothers in the neighborhood and they bring their children to the celebration too. Eventually JP joins the mix of children and they have their own little party while the adults make small talk around them.

After talking to a few of the other mothers before today, you and Carmilla had decided to start sending Jamie to daycare so that you could start to work again. One of the local new stations had been holding auditions (via demo from college) for a new part-time News Anchor/Reporter. You’d sent in a tape and they’d liked you.

You’d done an interview via Skype call and you’d been hired to start in a couple months. You were going to be introduced and slowly assimilated into the team, but they’d given you a bit of extra time to get your personal affairs together per your request. The hours on your contract varied and you’d signed only for the first year. You’d been told if you did well, there was a change you’d become a regular on the show.

Both you and Carmilla were going to be having pretty demanding jobs now, so you’d asked your father if he would mind watching Jamie those hours you were both not able to (you hated to do it, but you and Carmilla were starting to strain with only one source of income and Carmilla’s refusal to use her inheritance unless it was an emergency which you completely understood), and he’d been completely fine with it, almost insisted on it. He’d told you that since he had retired, he wasn’t doing much of anything else. And he loved Jamie a lot so it wasn’t any trouble for him to watch Jamie more often than before.

With things were moving forward quickly with your lives, you decide to enjoy these last few months you have with just lounging around taking care of Jamie while you can.


	6. Independence (Sort Of)

**You feel great starting to** work again but you aren’t ashamed to admit that:

  1.        Yes, you really miss Jamie. And
  2.        Yes, you really miss Carmilla.



It’s hard being away from them. And without a set schedule at your job you never know for sure when you’ll get to see them. Especially with Carmilla’s job often keeping her out at odd hours now that she’s starting to take on a more serious case or two. It’s hard sometimes not having her around, you won’t pretend it isn’t. And it sucks because you’d gotten used to always being with Jamie. You were having a hard time staying away from them.

Those first few months, you’d call in every couple hours to check in to the point you’re sure it annoys them. But you couldn’t help but worry. It was what mother’s did.

You don’t usually have long nights. You’re usually home by around six at night, sometimes you have to work on different news packages for different stories, but they never kept you up too late. However Carmilla was never home later than ten. She didn’t have to go in until she wanted to really, but she was gone by nine or ten most days. There was a lot of office work from what you could tell, with her having to put her cases and arguments together with collected evidence.

You’d watched over her shoulder once on a case that wasn’t so big and the somewhat similarities to your jobs had surprised you. Your chosen weren’t much different.

Even with Carmilla gone so much, you still make her dinner and leave it in the oven for her to warm up when she got home. And after she eats, she collapses into bed and cuddles up with you. Depending on how warn out she was would decide how exactly you spent that precious time together.

From what you can tell, your father really seems to enjoy taking care of Jamie. He’d always kept you from harm, so you know you can trust him with watching them after daycare when you can’t pick them up afterwards. You think he’s just lonely at home by himself so you’re glad you can give him some form of company with Jamie.

The woman who runs the daycare, Ms. Row, says Jamie is great at making friends with the other toddlers, even though they’re still just babbling and crawling most of the time, and that they’re a really good kid which makes you incredibly happy.

Jamie’s vocabulary grows from just the occasional “ _Marm_ ” and “ _Ma_ ” to things like “ _Hungy_ ” and “ _Tire_ ” which is helpful to you. You still get emotional sometimes when Jamie talks because the days when they were still tiny and they’d thrown up on a few of your favorite shirts are still fresh in your mind.

They scribble on paper with crayons and your father gives you their “portraits” when you to pick them up from his house. Jamie would cling to your legs and smile up at you like you’re their sunshine when they saw you now.

And it kind of makes you feel like you are.

* * *

 

 **It’s at around fourteen months** when you think Jamie is having nightmares. You first notice on a night when Carmilla is home a little early and you’re putting them to bed. There’s something about Carmilla in a pencil skirt and a blazer that makes you want to undress her.

She walks in when you’re looking in the fridge for something to snack on and you have no idea she’s going to be home. You turn as she sets her bag by the door and kicks off her shoes. She looks tired. But you can also see the rise of her chest just over the top of her blouse and you register her talking, but you’re too busy imagining the feel of your hands on her skin.

“—even listening to me?” You look from where your eyes had wandered to her thighs back to her face. Carmilla's giving you an unimpressed look which makes you blush.

“What?” You cough and she scoffs. Carmilla crosses her arms and walks towards you until you’re pressed back against the refrigerator with her standing over you.

“I was just telling you that our suspect took a plea bargain so I got to come home early tonight.” She uncrosses her arms and puts a hand on your waist. The other slides up your arm until she cups your jaw. You let out a breath, watching as her eyes scan your face. “But someone got distracted and tuned me out.”

“Sorry.”

“No you’re not.” Instead of trying to think up a reply to that, you grip the lapel of her blazer and pull her in to press your lips against hers. Carmilla’s lips move with yours almost greedily. You feel a warmth building in your stomach and tilt your head to better your angle. Carmilla make a move towards your bedroom. So you part your lips from hers to shake your head which makes her stop.

“Right here.” You whisper.

“In the kitchen?” She asks and you nod. Her lips curl into a small smile at your clear eagerness and she kisses you again. Carmilla hand cups your jaw gently and as much as you loved how gently she treated you sometimes, now was one of those times you needed her to just take your fast and hard until you could barely remember to breathe.

But that usually took a little coaxing or a fight.

So you flip your positions her back is pressed against the cool, silver surface of the refrigerator. Her hands slide under your shirt. (It’s one of hers. You’d put it on mainly because it still smelled like her after the wash.)

You press yourself against her and she hums appreciatively against your lips when you push her blazer off her shoulders. She’s just starting to slide her hands into the back of your shorts to squeeze your ass when you hear a scream from the baby monitor.

You tear your lips from hers and her hands are off of you in a second. Without a word, you both race to Jamie’s room and see them sobbing in their crib. You exchange a look with Carmilla before you walk to pick them up while she checks around the room for any sign of what might have freaked them.

“Shh. Shh. Mommy’s here. And Marm’s here too.” You turn back towards Carmilla and she moves so she’s standing next to you. Carmilla runs her hands through their hair comfortingly.

“You’re fine.” She adds. The combination of her stroking their head and you gently bouncing them in your arms seems to calm them down. You set Jamie back down once they’re cooing contently and tuck them back into their blankets. You and Carmilla stay by their crib until they drift back to sleep. Then you take Carmilla’s hand and lead her from the nursery.

“That was strange.” She says, once you’re back in the kitchen. You nod in agreement. “Do you think they were having a nightmare or something?”

“Maybe. I didn’t even know infants could _have_ nightmares.” You tell her and she throws an arm over your shoulders.

“Well, maybe they can. I don’t know what else could be the problem here.”

“I’m going to google it.” You decide and Carmilla snorts beside you.

“I think you rely way too heavily on the internet to answer all your questions.”

“Please, Google has like _all_ the answers to _everything_. Didn’t they tell you in college to use every available resource you have at your disposal?”

“Yes. But they _also_ told me that the Wikipedia is an unreliable source, _Laura._ ” You look at her and she’s smirking. You want to kiss that smirk right off her face.

“Okay, _Carmilla._ ” You turn from her side and lean back against the refrigerator. She moves toward you and you put your hands on her shoulders. She watches as you slide them down to the buttons of her blouse and fiddle with them. “Anyway while I am worried about Jamie, I think we were definitely in the middle of something.”

“Were we? I think I might need a reminder.” You roll your eyes at her. But you wrap an arm around her neck and pull her back down to kiss you and arch the length of your body into hers.

* * *

 

 **While you’re at work** and have some free time, you look up if it’s possible for your fourteen month old to have nightmares. Instead you find out your baby has probably just decided that they need an adult around 24/7 and they’re having separation problems.

Now that you’re thinking about it, you do remember Ms. Row offhandedly mentioning that Jamie would wake from naps crying sometimes, but that it wasn’t a serious problem so you shouldn’t worry about it too much. But now…

You call Carmilla.

“What do you think we should do?” You ask after you explain your new theory to her.

“Well, sweetheart, I think you’re going to have stop running to them every time they start crying. I think they’ll learn to calm themselves down if you don’t suddenly appear every time there’s a problem.”

“I—I don’t think I want to do that.” You tell her honestly. You’d feel heartless ignoring Jamie while they were crying. And what if something was actually wrong and you’d ignored them in their distress? What if—

“ _Laura._ ” The way she says your name snaps you from your panicked thoughts. Her tone is gentle and soft enough that you focus on her rather than your wild imagination. “If you don’t start now, Jamie will be completely dependent on you for a lot longer than they need to be.”

“I— Okay.” You tell her.

“Okay?”

“I won’t go running to Jamie every time they start crying. I—I’ll give them a bit of time to calm themselves down. This just feels like a horrible idea.”

“I know. But trust me.”

“I do. I trust you, Carm.”

* * *

 

 **It’s really difficult at** first. You do break from your resolve more than a few times. Jamie’s cries are impossible to ignore and most of the time you end up going to see what’s wrong. Though you don’t always go into the room, you always get up and hover outside their door for a few minutes until they’ve calmed themselves.

Jamie slowly starts to stop crying out. You’ll sometimes hear them wake through the monitors and make a bit of noise before they drift back off to sleep.

Even though it’s good that Jamie is growing up a bit you kind of want them to stop, because you wanted them to stay your bubbly little baby for as long as possible.

* * *

 

 **You’re starting to find** Jamie’s growingindependence a little heartbreaking. Their first full phrase becomes “I do it.” Which comes up mostly as you’re helping them get dressed to go to daycare.

Today is one of those days they want to dress themselves. So you hand them their shirt and they pull it over the head with a tiny bit of struggle. Their arms gets stuck, so you help which they don’t complain about. Then you help them step into their pants and you button the straps to their overalls.

You and Carmilla have decided when Jamie is two, you’ll take them shopping with you and let them pick out whatever they want to wear. Jamie is young but you think it’s a silly conception that children’s clothes should match or that they should wear certain “gender specified” clothing. They’re _children._ They should get to live a little, right?

But for now, it’s mostly bright colored shirts and overalls. After you’ve finished dressing Jamie, you turn and see Carmilla standing in the hallway with bedhead and dark circles under her eyes.

“You don’t need to get them dressed.” She tells you and you raise an eyebrow.

“Oh? Why not?”

“I’m staying home. I need a break and a little Jamie time.” You smile and stand up straight.

“Okay.” Carmilla turns from you to Jamie and crouches down.

“Come here, kiddo.” Jamie grins and stumbles awkwardly towards her. They fall into her arms and she picks them up with a groan. “Man, you’re getting bigger and bigger aren’t you?”

“Have a nice day off, Carm.” You tell her, moving to walk past her. “You deserve one.”

You give her a goodbye peck on the lips, then grab your things and head out.

* * *

 

 **Carmilla sends you pictures** of Jamie along with a few goofy selfies throughout the day. She’d somehow managed to get Jamie to make duck lips, stick out their tongue and make peace signs with her. Which keeps you smiling at your phone all day.

This goofy side to Carmilla was something you wish you saw more of. It was always been lurking beneath the surface of that disaffected façade she liked, but it really came out when she was with Jamie. You kind of feel like you’re falling in love with her all over again.

When your co-workers ask what’s got you all smiling and giggly, you show them the pictures and they tell you how adorable your baby is and how gorgeous your wife is (neither of you have rings on your fingers, but you don’t feel the need to correct them), as if you didn’t already know it.

You find out that afternoon that the news station wants to hire you as a permanent news anchor on the 6 o’clock news. Which you feel has to be a mistake because it’s at the start of prime time and there’s _no way_ they want a rookie like you getting that many viewers. But they tell you they have an opening for a junior anchor and you have to accept.

You return home with the exciting news to Carmilla who hugs you and congratulates you. Jamie hugs you too even though you know they don’t really know what’s so exciting. But just the thought of having their support makes you feel indescribably warm and content inside.


	7. Proposal

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is the one and only chapter in Carmilla's POV. Couldn't fit in anywhere else. But enjoy. <3

**Your day off had** been completely necessary. You worked an insane amount. You didn’t have a set amount of hours and some days you could likely go home earlier than you do but you don’t like leaving work undone. But that also cut into the amount of time you got to spend with your family. So when your bosses had offered you the day off once you’d finished with another case, you’d gladly taken it.

But you set those thoughts aside because your anniversary was coming up in a few weeks. The anniversary of that night eleven years ago when you’d invited Laura over with the worst intensions in mind, but it had turned out to be the best decision of your life.

With Jamie sitting in your lap, sleeping soundly with their head against your stomach, and you reading a novel that had been set aside for far too long lying in your (pretty nice) flat, you know you wouldn’t change a thing. Perhaps the way you’d approached her at first, but for whatever reason she _was_ still here. So you must be doing something right.

Eleven years is a long time. Before Laura you’d honestly thought the idea of remembering a date and keeping track of it was a stupid sentimental thing. But Laura has an annoying way of making you do things like this just because you know it will make her smile. And really it wasn’t necessarily her fault that her smile was one of most important things in the world to you.

Jamie stirs in your lap and you wrap your arm around their middle to keep them from tilting to either side. You hear a sad _‘meow’_ on your left and look down to see Fergie perched dejectedly on the side of your bed. So you sigh and pat the bed next to you. He hops up and settles into your side. You set your book down on the nightstand and stroke along Fergie’s spine, eliciting a soft puff from the cat.

The only thing that would make this afternoon that much more perfect were if Laura was also curled into your side with her leg thrown over yours and her head against your shoulder.

God, you’re completely and embarrassingly whipped. There was no denying how whipped you were.

You knew what you were going to do for your anniversary. You’d been meaning to do it for a while, but you’d been unsure if it was the right time. Now you were sure.

You’d had the ring for a few months now, stuffing it into the bottom of your work bag (you knew Laura wouldn’t go in there because you carried around arguably confidential records from work that you had to work on every now and then.) The idea had been sitting in the back of your mind for a long time, but you’d been unsure if you’d wanted to go through with it.

But now feels like the right time to do this.

You were going to propose.

But first you had to talk to Laura’s dad.

* * *

 

 **“Hey, Carmilla. I** **was** surprised when you called saying you were coming over. Is something wrong?” Laura’s father reaches forward to take Jamie from your arms which you’re fine with. Jamie was still kind of small, but they were getting heavy and you were by no means especially strong. So you hand them over to him easily.

“No, nothing’s wrong. I just kind of wanted to come and ask you something.”

Yes, you were going to ask Laura’s dad for his blessing. And no, you didn’t _need_ his blessing per se. There were plenty of arguments against the idea of asking a girl’s father for her hand in marriage, because it promoted the idea that women were property and that it was sexist etc etc.

But it was traditional to do so. And you wouldn’t feel right if you didn’t ask, regardless of his answer.

“Oh, then what is it?” He tilts his head at you, probably picking up on your internal conflict. So you clear your throat and being to explain.

“I know that you know that I’m in love with your daughter. Hell, I agreed to raise a _child_ with her, because I love her so much. And that’s something I won’t ever regret. You’ve raised a beautiful young woman that I love with everything I am.” This is weird. It’s really different having these thoughts to yourself than it is admitting it out loud. Especially to her _dad_. You feel your heart pounding in your chest and you can almost hear it beating in your ears. You lick your lips and he stares at you, waiting for you to continue. “So I came to ask for you blessing in asking her to marry me.”

“Oh.” He says, his eyebrows raised. “Oh.” He repeats it and sits down, setting Jamie down on their feet. “ _Oh._ ”

“Yeah, I mean, we’ve been together for a while, and we’ve been doing okay up until now. So I can promise I can keep providing for her, it’s just—”

“Carmilla, when have you ever needed my permission to do anything with Laura?” It’s a joke. You know that. But now guilt settles in your stomach and you swallow.

“You’ve apologized again and again for treating me badly. But I never apologized to you. I’m sorry for anything I did that made you feel alienated from her.” Laura’s father shakes his head.

“You make her happy. That’s all I want. Of course you have my blessing. She loves you.” You kind of want to cry, and you think you might until he hugs you. Jamie’s waddles to you and their arms wrap around your leg and they hug you too. You swallow the sob building in your throat and hug him back.

“Thank you.” You tell him and he pulls away with his hands strong on your shoulders.

“Just don’t break her heart. She’s a special girl.”

“I know.” You tell him. “Trust me, I know.”

* * *

 

 **On the day of** your anniversary a couple weeks later, you pretend to go into work. Laura looks disappointed, having taken the day off, but you pretend not to notice. She’d given you her cheek when you went to kiss her before you left, and you know she’s mad. But you hope she’ll forgive you for it later.

As you’re driving to get everything prepared, you get a call from Lafontaine.

“Sup.” You say, putting the phone on speaker and setting it in one of the cupholders.

“You know Laura’s really upset. She’s on the phone with Perry ranting because she thinks you forgot.”

“Good. Then everything’s going according to plan, right?” Yes, you’d gotten the ginger twins involved.

“This is the worst plan ever.”

“It’s _your_ plan.” Lafontaine sighs in your ear.

“I know, I know. Look we’re going to go ahead and take Laura out for the day and drop Jamie off at her dad’s as planned. He knows about everything too, right?”

“Yep. He offered to watch Jamie as long as we got pictures.”

“Oh, don’t worry about pictures. I’m filming it.”

“Great.” You say, unable to sound as displeased as you want to. You’re nervous. You aren’t really sure why, because at this point you can’t imagine her saying no. But just the idea of _proposing_ to Laura has your stomach flipping and you kind of want to throw up.

“We’ll see you tonight.” Lafontaine says and you can hear Perry calming Laura in the background.

“Don’t let her get too mad at me. I’d kind of like to make it out of this alive.”

“You and I both know she’s going to kill you.” You sigh.

“Yeah, you’re probably right.”

* * *

 

 **You do a pretty** good job if you say so yourself. You’d rented out a restaurant and the employees had helped you set up candles everywhere. They lined the entire restaurant in candles where they would fit, leaving that place basking in pale candlelight. The manager tells you if the place burns down you were paying for it, which you mostly ignore. You have the chef make two of their best Baked Salmon dishes and they were sitting hot and ready on a table behind you.

You’re in your usual all black, leather pants and your work blazer that you hadn’t changed out of. Everything was perfect and ready at six just as the sun was setting.

It’s about 5:38 when Perry’s car pulls up to the restaurant and they coax the clearly pissed off tiny reporter inside.

“Seriously, I’m really not hungry. I just want to go home and—” She stops talking when she looks up at you. Then she looks back and Perry and Lafontaine, who are smiling like idiots. You can see the confusion on her face as she looks back and forth between the three of you. Finally she crosses her arms over her stomach. “Carmilla? What is this?”

“It’s our anniversary.” You say and she looks down.

“Well, yeah. But—Well I thought you forgot.” You roll your eyes, but you catch a smile on her lips as she looks around the restaurant.

“I wouldn’t forget something this important. Who do you think I am?”

“I think you’re an asshole.” She’s smiling though. She shakes her head and she walks to you. You hold out your hands and take hers. She squeezes your hands. “You’re such an asshole, you let me be mad all day while Perry and Lafontaine dragged me around Toronto thinking you _forgot.”_

“Maybe have more faith in me, cupcake.” She smacks your shoulder lightly.

“Well what am I supposed to think when you leave all dressed up for work?” Then she sighs and steps into you, resting her forehead on her collarbone. “This looks really beautiful though, Carm.”

“I didn’t have them bring you here just so you could look at it. I have to ask you something.” She steps away and you look past her momentarily and see Lafontaine ready with their camera and Perry smiling like a proud mother.

“What is it?” She looks nervous and your heart skips a beat. She’s just so beautiful, and you reach into the chest pocket on the inside of your jacket and pull the velvet box from it. Laura’s breath hitches as you open it and slide down onto one knee.

And then your mind blanks.

“I had a whole speech prepared and I forget the entire thing.” You admit, and Laura laughs with tears in her eyes. “All I can say is that I really love you. You’re the love of my life and I can’t imagine where I would be without you. So will you marry me, Laura Hollis?” She’s already nodding with her hands covering her mouth.

“Of course I will.” She chokes on the last word. “Yes. _Yes,_ I’ll marry you.”

You stand and slide the ring onto her finger. She pulls you to her and kisses you once. Then again. And again. And again.

“You’re the absolute worst. Letting me be mad all day and then proposing in such a beautiful place just to get back on my good side.” You press you lips to hers one last time and then pull away from her.

“I’d love to make out with you right now, but our food is getting cold and we have an audience.”

“Oh don’t mind us. Give us something to show the grandkids.”

“Lafontaine!” Perry exclaims with a nudge and they laugh.

“Fine.” They put away their camera. “I’ll have copies of this made. Congrats on the engagement you smitten idiots.”

“Thanks for the help.” You say and Lafontaine nods with a wide smile. Perry gives you a thumbs up and tells you to be safe. And then they leave. You gesture for Laura to sit down at a booth and she does.

“So, tell me exactly how mad you were today.” You say, uncovering your dishes. You slide into the booth across from her and she rests her chin in her hands with a lovestuck look on her face that makes your heart flutter.

“I was so incredibly and completely pissed.”


	8. Rings

**You didn’t think** **you** could ever grow more attracted to Carmilla. But, seeing her basking in candlelight and the slight glimmer of a sparkling new diamond on your finger, you don’t see how Carmilla could be any more perfect. Your fingers were itching to touch her.

You can tell she worked kind of hard on making this night perfect for you. You were slightly embarrassed for actually thinking she’d actually forgotten your anniversary. It was just a date. But you’re sentimental that way and you’re fully aware Carmilla dealt with your “sentimental crap” just because it made you happy.

The dinner she’d had prepared for the two of you was amazing. You’re almost mad that she looks so nice while you’re in regular jeans and a cardigan so you tell her.

“I wish I’d had a heads up so I could have gotten dressed nicer.” You look down at your empty plate pushing around a piece of pepper in the small puddle of juices with your fork. You look up to her and Carmilla’s giving you that smile you know is reserved just for you. You feel a blush rising to your cheeks. You’ve again been reduced to a twelve year old by her beautiful grin.

“I like how you look when you’re dressed down.” She sets her fork down and grabs your hand from across the booth. “You look incredibly sexy in sweatpants, and a t shirt. With your hair tied up in that messy bun you’re good at.”

You press your lips together in an effort to keep from smiling, but her lips twist into a smirk and you can’t help it. You don’t know if you want to kiss her or kick her. You go for the latter, tapping the toe of your shoe against her shin and she barely flinches from the light contact. She just raises an eyebrow at you and you huff at her.

“You’re still such a flirt.” You say.

“Cupcake, when did I ever stop?”

“I really want to kiss you again.” You admit and she squeezes your hand.

“What’s stopping you?”

“I know if I start, I won’t be able to stop.”

“Well, we’re alone here, Ms. Hollis.” You roll your eyes at her suggestion.

“Public indecency is still public indecency.”

“Oh, where’s that sense of adventure?” She traces patterns into the back of your hand and you want her fingers a lot lower than that.. _._ “You remember when we were still in high school, and we had sex in that Janitor’s closet?”

“ _Carmilla_.” You hiss, and you’re not really sure why you’re whispering considering she wasn’t wrong about the two of you being here alone. “Why have sex in an empty restaurant when we have a perfectly good bed a home?”

“Maybe I have a list of places I want to make you cum stored away. And maybe this is one of them.”

“You—You do _not_ have a list like that.” You say, and the way she’s looking at you— “Wait, do you?”

She taps her head and her smile widens, “All up here, cutie.”

“Wow, okay.” Your palms are sweaty and you pull away from her to wipe them onto your pants. Was it hot in here? It suddenly felt really hot in here.

“Is your answer still a no?”

“Well, I wouldn’t say that.” You say and you lick your lips. Carmilla reaches forward and quickly grabs your hand again.

“Come here.” Her voice is thick with the same want you’re feeling. You stand and move towards her, completely forgetting where you are. Because, if she talked to you like that, she could have you wherever she wanted. You move into that familiar position straddling Carmilla’s lap and her lips press against your collarbone. You let out a breath against the top of her head. Your hands rise to tangle in her hair as her lips move up the curve of your neck to press against your jawline. She pushes your hair aside and your breath hitches feeling her tongue dart out against your skin as she kisses the line of your jaw.

Her mouth feels hot against your skin and you keep your hands tangled in her hair so she can’t move them off of you. Carmilla peppers kisses up the curve of your neck, her arm curls around your waist and her free hand slides up the back of your shirt. You press further into her and moan into her mouth when she finally kisses you.

You drag your hands down her front, pawing briefly at her chest before pushing your hands back up to cup the back of her neck. You try to breathe through your nose so you don’t have to separate your lips from hers. You nip her bottom lip a little too hard and she pulls away from you.

“Ow.” Her tongue darts out and licks the spot, and you smile apologetically.

“Sorry.”

“Eager aren’t we?”

“Shut up.” She laughs against your lips when you kiss her again.

“Je t’aime.” She whispers between kisses. You smile against her lips because it had been a long time since she’d spoken to you in French. You’d missed it.

“I love you too.” You murmur, and you capture her lips again. You couldn’t imagine kissing anyone but Carmilla for the rest of your life. The ring on your finger seems to gain weight and that forever is even more plausible than it had ever been. You were kissing not your girlfriend, but your fiancée. Your _fiancée._

You pull your lips from hers. Carmilla tries to kiss you again but you shake your head and she pulls away.

“Can I ask you a question?”

“Yeah, of course.”

“How long had you been planning this?” She bites her lip and laughs a bit at that.

“I’ve had the ring for a while. Like a _really_ long time. The restaurant was my idea. But the plan to keep you out of the loop was Lafontaine’s. It’s been in the works for maybe three weeks?” She slides a hand into the back of your pants and her fingers stay just above the swell of your ass. You slide a hand under the collar of her blouse and rub her skin.

“You’re so corny.” Carmilla fakes an offended look.

“You love my corniness.” You kiss her so you won’t have to answer her. Carmilla allows you to control the slow pace of the kiss while her hands slide completely down your pants and occupy themselves kneading your ass.

You moan gently into her mouth and you push her blazer from her shoulders, forcing her hands from your ass. You take her hands and place them on your chest over the material of your tank top. You bite down gently on her lower lip when she squeezes your breasts.

“More.” You breathe, feathering kisses along her jawline.

And she gives you so much more because Carmilla always gave you everything you wanted.

* * *

 

 **You pick up Jamie** from your father’s house a lot later than you mean to. Your father had held them in his arms while they slept and sat on the couch watching television. The first thing he did when you entered the house was look at the ring on your finger and congratulate the two of you on your engagement.

Carmilla thanks him for taking care of Jamie, while he hands them off to her gently.

“It was no problem. They’re well behaved, so it’s really easy to care for them.” Carmilla gives him a nod and leaves to strap Jamie into their seat in the back.

“So you were in on it?” You ask your father when Carmilla’s gone and he shrugs.

“She asked me for my blessing a few weeks ago. I knew it was coming.”

“She asked for your blessing?” You’re surprised by Carmilla’s apparent visit to ask your father for his blessing. Sometimes you do forget she has an older air to her and that she probably is, deep down, very old fashioned.

“Sure did. Surprised me, too. Carmilla’s a good woman. I’m glad you’re with her.” You nudge your dad, embarrassed. Then Carmilla calls to you from the car.

“Laura, we’ve gotta get home.”

“Sorry, I’ll be there in a second.” You call back, then you turn back to you father and hug him. He hugs you back immediately and presses a kiss to the top of your head.

“See you later, sweetheart.”

“Bye, Dad.”

* * *

 

 **You look up how** long it usually takes to plan a wedding a few months later in November. The two of you have barely talked about the actual planning of your wedding or a date or anything really. You’d both decided to wait to talk about it, but lately every time you looked at the ring on your finger, you felt yourself getting impatient.

You just really wanted to be able to call Carmilla your wife. You at least wanted to buy Carmilla an engagement ring of her own because you felt butterflies when you looked at yours. You wanted her to have that feeling too. So you’d been saving because the price of an engagement ring would really put a hole in your saving that were actually starting to actually flourish a bit.

Carmilla was worth the money.

She’s out buying groceries while you’re sitting on the couch scrolling through engagement rings on different websites. Jamie’s sitting in your lap playing with one of your hands. Occasionally they try to put your fingers in their mouth, which you resist as much as you could.

You were looking for one as gorgeous as your own eternity band that looked insanely expensive. And you were looking into getting her an eternity band as well despite its costliness.

“Do you think Marm would like one of these?” You ask Jamie and they look up at you with drool dripping from the side of their mouth. They make a confused noise and you shake your head, wiping at the side of their mouth with their shirt. “I just want this to be perfect.”

“Want what to be perfect?” You hear Carmilla ask as she walks in with a few grocery bags.

“Um, nothing. Just a, uh, a news package I’m working on.” It’s not entirely a lie because you _are_ working on a news package that’s going to be aired soon. Carmilla sets her bags down and starts to head back outside to grab some more.

“Really now?”

“Mhmm. Yep.” She leaves out the door and a ring on the website catches your eye. You make a mental note of the name and decide to go in to the store to check it out, and you close the tab. You pull up the videos and interviews from your story and bite your lip pressing play on one of them. Carmilla comes back in a few minutes later and puts the rest of the groceries on the counter.

She locks the door and then comes over to you and plops down onto the couch next to you.

“Do you mind?” She nods to Jamie in your lap who’s occupied themselves grabbing at the cloth of your sweatpants. She shake your head and lift your arms to let Carmilla move Jamie into her lap.

“Maaarm.” Jamie grabs at her hair and she holds their middle to keep them standing in her lap.

“Yeah, I missed you too, kiddo.” You honestly couldn’t be happier to be marrying her.

* * *

 

 **During a lull at** the news station the following Monday when you know you won’t be on air anytime soon but you’re kind of still expected to be around, you decide to go out and look at that ring. You tell your supervisor where you’re going and they wish you luck and tell you to take your time, which you’re so grateful for. You’re not really sure why everyone at the station is so nice and lenient with you, but you weren’t going to complain about it.

There’s only one other person browsing the store when you walk in, and the retail worker looks up at you bored. They perk up when they meet your eye.

“Welcome!”

“Hi.” You say and you rub your gloved hands together. You’ve already forgotten the name of that ring. “I was thinking about getting an engagement ring for my fiancée, she bought me this ring,” you pull off your glove and show them “a couple months ago. And I’d kind of like to get her one like it. Do you think you could help me out?”

“Of course. Let me get a closer look at that ring of yours.” You pull it off and hand it to them. They turn it in their hand and whistle. “Your fiancée wasted no expense on you.” You’re silent and they set the ring down on the counter. “You’ve made my job 100% easier since you kind of know what you’re looking for.”

“Oh, okay. Good.” You give them a smile and they smile back. They move to grab the rack of eternity rings and you’re surprised by the variety of designs. The worker whose name tag you finally read as ‘ _Brian’_ pulls a ring from the mix and holds it up along with yours.

“This is your ring, but I’m assuming you don’t want exactly the same ring as yours.” You nod at that and he pushes the ring back into place and hands you back your ring. You slip it back onto your finger and look as much as you can through the variety. Brian watches you for a few seconds. Then he pulls out one and hands it to you.

“What do you think of this one?”

~~~

It takes you thirty minutes to find a ring you really like with a lot of help from Brian. The other customer has already left by the time you’ve decided and Brian helps rings you up. You thank him and leave the store feeling accomplished. Now, you had to decide how you were going to give it to her.

And her birthday is what you deem the perfect opportunity.

* * *

 

 **You wake her on** her birthday with breakfast in bed. You make all her favorites and set it down next to the bed. Carmilla is normally a pretty light sleeper, so you’d been careful sliding your arms from around her and climbing out of bed. She’d shifted in the time you’d been gone making breakfast and now laid on her stomach with her nose pressed into the pillows.

You hop onto the bed and straddle her waist, pushing her hair aside and pressing kisses into the back of her neck. She groans underneath you and you push her oversized shirt down to expose her shoulder and pepper small kisses there.

“Mm, Laura.” You press an open mouthed kiss to her spine and she shivers underneath you. “As much as I’m enjoying this, it feels like it’s earlier than ten am.”

“But it’s your birthday.” She tries to turn around to face you, and you move to let her. Then you throw your leg back over her waist and settle on her stomach. You lean down and kiss her. “Happy Birthday, Carm.”

“Thank you, creampuff.” You kiss her again. When you try to move to grab her breakfast, her hands grip your waist tighter and grind you down against her stomach. A soft gasp comes from your lips from how good that light pressure had felt through the thin layer of your panties. You try to shake your head at her in protest.

“Carmilla, your food’s going to get cold.”

“I’m sure your cooking would taste wonderful, but there’s something else I’d rather eat right now.” You grip her shoulders as she holds your hips and grinds you against her stomach again and again. You press down on her involuntarily and you’re breathing a little heavier.

“I hate that you know exactly what turns me on.” You hiss and she smiles at you as she slides her hands under your shirt and grips your bare waist.

“No, you don’t.” You don’t. You _really_ don’t.

* * *

 

 **Her food ends up** getting cold and she follows you into the kitchen while you reheat it. While she eats, you make some boiled eggs for Jamie to eat, and then go to wake them up. You tell them it’s Carmilla’s birthday and that it’s a special day for her. They waddle into the kitchen by your side.

“Up.” They demand when they make it to Carmilla. She rolls her eyes, but lifts them into her lap. “Hap Birfday.” They say. You think the smile on Carmilla’s face could provide enough energy to keep your flat lit for a year.

“Thanks, bud.” She kisses the top of their head and they pucker their lips. So Carmilla lowers her face so they can press a kiss to her cheek. Then she lets them down and they return to you.

“Hungy.”

“You sure are a bossy one aren’t you?” You say, but you move their cut up boiled eggs to the table and they climb up into their chair and start eating. You sit down next to Carmilla as she eats a strip of bacon.

“Aren’t you going to eat?” She asks you and you shake your head.

“I ate earlier.” She raises an eyebrow at you and you blush. “Not _that_. I meant _food_. God.”

You bury your face in your hands because Carmilla always knows exactly how to embarrass you. You glance at Jamie, but they’re paying you no attention.

“If you say so.” She hands you a strip of bacon which you take, because who doesn’t like bacon? “So, am I to assume you have some fantastic cheesy outing planned for us today?”

You shake your head and she raises an eyebrow.

“I don’t have a thing planned.” You tell her and she looks confused.

“Who are you and what have you done with my fiancée?” Your heart does that annoying fluttering thing in your chest and you smile at her.

“Your _fiancée_ is giving you a day to do whatever _you_ want to do.”

“Hmm.” She sits in silence and you watch her finish off her meal and burps which you wrinkle your nose at. She really did have terrible manners. Jamie follows her example and burps. You roll your eyes at them because you’re finding Jamie’s taking after Carmilla in the manners department.

She licks her fingers and then reaches for her hand. You let her because her mouth has touched probably every part of your body, so you decide not to get annoyed at the moisture on her fingers. “I know what I want to do today.”

“What’s that?”

“I want to sit in bed, or on the couch, or wherever. And I want to just watch movies and cuddle all day.”

“If you’d told me when we met you were a cuddler, I wouldn’t have believed you.”

“We were too busy making out to talk about cuddling.” She reminds you and you shake your head, looking pointedly at Jamie. Carmilla rolls her eyes at you with a huff and shoves a forkful of waffles into her mouth.

“Is that what you want to do?”

“Yep.” She answers with her mouth still full. Gross.

“Sounds perfect.” She pulls you to her and you decide not to protest when she kisses the side of your head.

* * *

 

 **You do exactly that.** You lie next to Carmilla all day eating popcorn and cuddling. Jamie alternatively sits on the floor playing with their toys, or napping between the two of you.

You, of course, change them when need be and get them food when lunch rolls around. By four, you’ve watched three different child friendly films because Jamie does get transfixed on the television sometimes and you don’t want to expose them to anything questionable quite yet. You tell Carmilla you have a present for her and she press her nose into the curve of your neck.

“You didn’t have to get me anything.”

“Of course I did. It’s your _birthday_. You don’t turn twenty-eight just any day.”

“I don’t a reminder I’m getting old.” She says good-naturedly and you kiss her.

“Oh come on. You’re not old.”

“I feel three hundred.”

“Shhh.” You put a finger against her lips and she kisses it. “You’ll always be eighteen in my mind.”

“How sweet.” She mumbles against your finger and you move away from her.

“I’ll be right back.” You go into the bedroom and find the wrapped ring in it box in one of your drawers and take a deep breath. This was it. No turning back now. You return to the living room and find Carmilla holding Jamie in her lap, with her chin resting on the top of their head. You hadn’t been gone long, but it had apparently been long enough for Carmilla to start reading a book that Jamie had probably pushed into her lap.

She glances at you when you come back, but doesn’t stop reading to them. You sit down next to them and hold the small box in your hands.

“Okay. Now what sound does a cow make, huh?”

“Mooooo.” Jamie recites and smiles proud of themselves.

“That’s right! How about,” she flips the page “a duck?”

You watch and join in every now and then as Carmilla and Jamie go through the book of animals. Jamie slides from Carmilla’s lap and sets the book down on the ground. Then they shuffle off probably to find another book.

“When I first met you I would have never thought you’d be this good with kids.” You tell Carmilla and she laces her fingers with yours.

“Feeling reminiscent today?” You shrug. “I’m a Jack of many trades.” She continues and you laugh at that.

“I have your gift.” You press the box into her free hand and she releases your hand to turn it in hers.

“What is it?”

“Open it and see.” She gives you a questioning look and pulls apart the wrapping paper carefully and her breath hitches when she sees the velvet box.

“Laura—”

“Finish opening it.”

She swallows, but does what you ask her to, flipping open the box.

“Laura, you shouldn’t have.”

“Put it on.” You urge. You looks up at your briefly before she pulls the ring from the box and sets it down. Then she slides it onto her finger.

“How much did this cost?” She asks.

“Do you like it?” You ask in return instead of answering her question.

“I love it.” She slides a hand to the back of your neck and pulls you into her. You fall into the soft pressure of her lips on yours and you want to make out with her right there on the couch, but the soft patter of little feet makes you pull away from her and Jamie rounds the couch.

“This one.” They say, handing the book to you and Carmilla pulls them up onto the couch.

“Alright, this one.”


	9. The Inevitable

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Very nervous about this chapter, enjoy regardless!

**If Carmilla had seemed** smitten before you’d put a ring on her finger, it was even more obvious now. Carmilla didn’t know how to love without constantly showing her affection in random displays. With random gentle kisses to your temple and soft caresses. She’d occasionally bring one of your favorite cupcakes home and hand it off to you wordlessly.

She’d even dropped by the station once and taken you out for an impromptu lunch date. (After she’d left you’d gotten so many comments on how pretty she was like you didn’t already know.) You thank her for everything she does of course. And you enjoy the attention and affection she gives to you. You like how special she constantly makes you feel and you repay every gesture as best you can.

After Carmilla’s birthday, you’d discussed it with her and decided to wait on cementing your wedding plans. You’d already waited all these years to get engaged, what was a year or so before you started planning your actual wedding?

You want to pour your focus with your family into Jamie for now. You don’t need to go to the news station until around four or five, so you’d pulled Jamie from daycare and you spend your off-time working on their speech. As the months pass their speech improves word by word and their understanding of directions gets better as well.

On the downside, with their growing mental capacity their imagination seems to have improved as well. While it’s amazing seeing the things they draw start to change from scribbles to actual forms, they also start to have actual fears rather than the separation issues they’d been facing before now.

They get to a point that Jamie won’t sleep in their own room anymore. At first it doesn’t bother you having Jamie sleep in bed with you and Carmilla. If you’re being completely honest, it doesn’t bother you at all feeling needed by them, but you have no idea what’s wrong until you sit them down and ask.

You ask one night when you’re picking Jamie up from your father’s after a show. They’re still half asleep, but they wake up enough to be lucid on the ride back home. When you try to take them back to their room they whine and you stop outside their door. You crouch down in front of them and pull their thumb from their mouth.

“Hey, what’s wrong? Why don’t you want to go sleep in your room?”

“Monsters.” They say after a moment.

“Excuse me?”

“Monsters.” They repeat in a small voice and they point with drool covered fingers into their room. “There.”

“In your room?” You ask just to clarify. They nod and you pull them into a hug. “Alright. Let’s go back to me and Marm’s room.” Jamie wraps their arms around your neck and lets you lift them into your arms. (And that’s taking a lot more effort with them growing and getting heavier and heavier.)

You stay up with Jamie laying with their arms wrapped around your middle until Carmilla gets back from the office. When she walks into the room you put a finger over your lips to indicate to her to keep it down and you point to Jamie. She nods and quietly gets changed before she slides into bed with you.

“Did you figure out what the problem is?” Carmilla whispers as she eases into your side and presses a kiss to your cheek. You turn to kiss her and you bite your lip when she pulls away.

“Yeah.” You finally answer and she rests her forehead against yours. “They somehow have decided there are monsters in their room?”

“Really?”

“Really.” She turns her gaze down to where Jamie is curled comfortably into you and runs her fingers through their short curly hair.

“Wonder where they got that one from.” You shrug in response. “Well I think I have an idea of how to fix it. Give me a couple days.”

* * *

 

 **It takes her a** couple days, but she comes home early two days later with a bag in her hand and a triumphant smile on her face. You’re sitting on the couch while Jamie draws with crayons on the floor. Jamie stands when they see her and run to hug her.

“Marm!” They say happily and she crouches to receive their hug. She winks at you over their shoulder and your eyebrows rise. What did she have planned? She pulls away from them and holds them by their shoulders, talking to them seriously.

“I heard you have a monster problem.”

“Mhmm.” They nod and point towards their room. “There.”

She stands up straight and opens the plastic bag she brought in with her. She pulls a spray bottle from the bag. It’s decorated with stickers and in big letters the words “ _Monster Spray”_ are printed on it. You smile as she brandishes the bottle to them.

“Well lucky for us, I know how to fix that. This is monster spray and it makes the monsters run away because they think it’s icky.” Carmilla sticks out her tongue and makes a sound of disgusts that makes Jamie giggle. “Let’s go try it out, yeah?”

They take her hand and you follow as she leads them to their room. They stop at the door and don’t budge. You rest your hands on their shoulders while Carmilla releases their hand.

“Here. I’ll go first.” She walks inside and first spray under their bed. Then she looks underneath and looks back up with a grin. “Come look. No monsters under here.”

Jamie plays with the end of their shirt nervously but when you nudge them forward, they walk towards Carmilla and peek under the bed slowly. They laugh excitedly when they apparently see nothing.

“All gone!” They exclaim.

“All gone.” Carmilla confirms. “Tell me where else they were.”

You lean against the door frame and watch as Jamie leads Carmilla throughout the room and sprays any suspicious area.

“There. All finished.” She says a few minutes later. “Do you think you can sleep in here again?” They look around cautiously for a moment, then they nod.

“Yeah.” They hug Carmilla and she wraps an arm around their shoulder. “Thank you, Marm.” You can tell she’s not trying to, but she smiles wide at that and hugs them a little tighter.

“Anytime, kiddo.”

* * *

 

 **You’d gone into work** shortly afterwards, but as soon as you’d gotten home Carmilla had kissed you fast and hard. You weren’t expecting the intensity of the kiss and you have to remind yourself you’re supposed to kiss her back. Then she’d led you back to your bedroom and stripped you down. Her lips felt like she was almost greedily taking in the feel of your skin. You think it’s the excitement of finally having your bed to yourselves as she presses you against the mattress and makes you see stars.

Now lying with her ear pressed to your chest listening to the dull rhythm of your heartbeat, Jamie pops back into mind and you ask, “Where’d you get the monster spray idea?”

You suppose you could probably talk about anything else after mind-blowing sex, but Carmilla just snorts and moves until she’s hovering over you again. She kisses you lazily and you sigh happily when she pulls away.

“I talked to Perry. She suggested it.”

“Wow, you voluntarily talked to Perry?” Carmilla smiles and you think she might kiss you again.

“Shut up.” She tells you instead and you roll your eyes. You flip onto your side and face her. Her eyes wander down to your bare chest and her hand rubs small circles into your hip. You don’t think you could ever tire of how content you feel after sex with her. It’s so peaceful and it feels like the entire world doesn’t exist except for you and her.

“Make me.” Carmilla’s eyes darken and her eyes drop to your lips. Then she’s kissing you again and you roll so you’re straddling her hips. And you pretend in this moment, that the rest of the world really doesn’t exist.

* * *

 

 **Carmilla is around for** breakfast the next morning and she nurses a cup of coffee while you cut up a breakfast of fresh fruits for Jamie.

“Did you have bad dream, Mommy?” Jamie asks and you furrow your eyebrows as you finish up. You set your knife down before turning your gaze to them.

“No. Why?” You meet their eye and they purse their lips deciding their words.

“You call for Marm like I do sometime when I have bad dream.” They explain. You hear Carmilla choke on her coffee and you feel blood rushing to your face. Sure, you’d been… Vocal last night. But you didn’t realize it had been loud enough for Jamie to hear you. They have no idea what you’re embarrassed about and you have no idea how to explain yourself to them.

And then you hear Carmilla’s coughing turn to full blown laughter and you’re sure your face is completely red. Jamie just looks back between you and Carmilla until Carmilla calms down and comes to sit at the table.

“Mommy was trying to be brave. She has bad dreams all the time just like you.” She taps their nose with a finger and they giggle.

“Mommy get scare too?”

“Mhmm.” Carmilla ruffles their hair and they smile. “Now eat up.”

She takes another sip from her mug with a deliberate smug look at you over the rim that makes your calming blush flare back up.

What had you done to deserve this embarrassment?

* * *

 

 **You start wedding planning** the December after Jamie’s second birthday in plans for a wedding next August on your next anniversary. You’d been around a lot more than necessary when Danny and Kirsch were getting married, so you know wedding planning is tedious.

However when you’re actually faced with the task of planning your own wedding, you’re made aware of aspects to a wedding you aren’t sure you’re equipped with handling yourself. So after a short discussion with Carmilla you hire a professional to help you out.

Help comes in the form of a woman named Charlotte Herring. She’s a thin, aging woman with dark brown hair and she walks you through the steps of planning with an incredible amount of patience. (You’re sure it must be annoying to have to deal with the amount of questions you ask.)

With her help you start a plan to make sure every part of your wedding and reception would come together in due time with the least amount of problems. She promises she’ll help you work through anything that goes wrong (as it is her job) to keep you from worrying about anything too much. And she does. Charlotte pulls everything together right on schedule.

You don’t invite many people. And altogether there are under fifty people at the ceremony in total. Lafontaine is your best person while Will, having flown in from Germany just for today, is Carmilla’s.

As you walk down the aisle with your arm linked with your father’s and see Carmilla turned towards you waiting at the altar, you think you’ll remember this feeling forever. Your guests are already standing in the pews of this chapel smiling at you. You look over them first, then to Carmilla again. Her smile makes your heart flutter with nervousness. And it hits you again that after today she’ll be your _wife_.

Jamie is standing by the altar as your ring bearer and Danny and Kirsch’s daughter looks beautiful beside them as your flower girl. Carmilla holds out a hand to you when you’re a few feet from her and your father releases you to allow you to grab her hand in both of yours.

“You ready?” She whispers and you nod.

“Always.”

* * *

 

 **The after reception is** the most magical part of the entire thing for you. Well the first dance to be specific. It’s after mingling with your guests and practically be drowned in congratulations from everyone you know. You and Carmilla share a glass of wine that reminds you so much of that first day you’d met her. And suddenly you’re filled with nostalgia.

After all your guests are ushered to their seats and the intro to _She Keeps Me Warm_ starts to play throughout the venue. Specifically for this moment, Charlotte had gotten you a version with an extended intro to give you and Carmilla time to get into place. Carmilla stands and takes your hand, and she leads you to the space she’s designated as the dance floor. You’d practiced this, because Carmilla had coaxed you into slow dancing with her several times throughout the years. Grinding you could do. Slow dancing always led to you stepping on her toes and making it completely unromantic even though it always made Carmilla laugh.

So you’d insisted on practicing this so that wouldn’t happen. You wanted this to be perfect.

However once you’re in Carmilla’s arms you completely forget everything and it must show on your face because her content expression changes to one of worry.

“Hey, what’s wrong?”

“I don’t remember any of the dance.” You say quickly and she laughs before she realizes you’re not kidding.

“What?”

“I’m sorry it’s just—You’re really pretty and all of this is so nice and—” She effectively stops your rambling by pulling you to her so you step on her toes.

“Stay right here. I’ve got you.” And then, as if on cue, Mary Lamberts’ voice starts up.

_'She says I smile like safety and home_

_I named both of her eyes “Forever” and “Please don’t go”'_

 

Carmilla starts to move and slowly the movements come back to you. But you like how close you are, so you don’t make any attempt to move from when you’re standing on her toes. You don’t break from Carmilla’s gaze. She looks at you with an intense amount of adoration in her eyes, and a small smile on her face.

In the back of your mind you’re a little embarrassed knowing everyone is watching you, but a stronger part can’t bring yourself to care because you’re so in love and the feeling of being with Carmilla was something a younger you would only read about in books and see in cheesy movies.

_'My love, my love, my love, my love_

_She keeps me warm, she keeps me warm.'_

* * *

**You spend a week** in Lake Louise, Alberta for your Honeymoon. You feel bad leaving Jamie in the care of your father during your trip, but he urged you to go an enjoy yourselves. Plus Jamie likes it over at your father’s. Plus Perry, Lafontaine, Danny and Kirsch all make plans to pick up Jamie throughout the week so Jamie can play with their children too so you try not to worry about it. Though you tell your dad you’ll be calling every day to make sure everything’s okay.

Carmilla wasted no expense on your hotel and booked you a cabin at the Paradise Lodge. From what you’ve heard, it’s a really beautiful place especially for honeymooners. And your cabin has a breathtaking view of the mountains. Which is all you get of them the first two days because Carmilla is more occupied keeping you in bed with her than go sightseeing.

You make a few weak attempts the first day to urge her to go out with you, but by the second day you’re just as enraptured in her as she is in you. Between all the orgasms and sleeping, there isn’t much time for much else those first two days.

* * *

 

 **On the third day** you actually get her to go to Banff National Park. She’d almost convinced you to lounge around another day, but after threatening not to touch her the rest of your Honeymoon she reluctantly agreed. Not to mention you didn’t want to waste the permits you’d had to get to visit the park in the first place. With summer ending, there aren’t too many other people there to deter your visit.

It’s absolutely beautiful to put it simply. You hike out to the Larch Valley the first day. The sights are stunning, even with all the damage done by the amount of people who filtered through here. The environment of Banff is easily one of the most unforgettable things you’ve ever laid eyes on.

You think it’s the high of seeing something so naturally beautiful that allows you to let Carmilla kiss you while you’re looking up at the towering golden larch trees above you. You cup her wrists in your hands while she holds your face in hers. You’re unsure if you would have stopped if it hadn’t been for the sounds of someone coming up behind you.

You part from a clearly disappointed Carmilla and lace your fingers with hers. And she lets you drag her along for another hour excitedly taking pictures of everything.

You spend the next couple days hiking to different locations. And on the seventh and final day of your honeymoon when you get back to your cabin, Carmilla corners you against the door.

She wastes no time peeling off your clothes layer by layer before she drops to her knees in front of you. She lifts one of your legs over her shoulders, then her mouth is on you and she leaves you weak and trembling against the door.

You go to bed afterwards to return the favor (more than once) and Carmilla falls asleep first practically lying on top of you. She holds you possessively in her sleep, clutching your head to her chest while you run your fingers up and down her arm and think about how inevitable the two of you were.

Carmilla was meant to be in your life and you were meant to be in hers. You don’t have a single doubt about it. You believe everything happens for a reason, and Carmilla came into your life by fate.

Because you and Carmilla were inevitable. There was no fighting that fact. And you never would.


	10. Epilogue

**You’re sitting with Jamie** in the principal’s office. He’s nursing a bloody nose and there’s a blooming bruise on his jawline. (Jamie had asked to start going by he/him pronouns in the second grade after asking you and Carmilla why you used gender neutral ones. After explaining you not wanting to push gender roles on him, he then asked if he could go by male ones instead which you and Carmilla were perfectly fine adjusting to.)

Jamie doesn’t meet your eye, instead glaring down at his hands as he picks at his cuticles in a way that reminds you so much of Carmilla. It figures Jamie got her attitude, but he’s also inherited your temper. To his right is another boy named Aaron Liman who had a black eye and a split lip. Aaron leans against the armrest with his cheek resting against his fist. His mother glares at you but you keep a neutral expression. Jamie wouldn’t have picked a fight without some reason.

“Mrs. Hollis-Karnstein, it seems your son punched Aaron during gym class.”

“He deserved it.” Jamie says and you shush him.

“You’ll get your turn. Let him finish.” The principle looks a little flustered, but he clears his throat and continues.

“Right. From the accounts of other students it was Jamie who struck first and the fight lasted a few minutes before one of the teachers broke them up.” You sigh in response. This isn’t your first time coming to a principal’s office on account of your son getting into a fight for whatever reason. They were for petty reasons at first, but they’ve evolved more into him finding issues with something ignorant a classmate says and him trying to solve it with his fists which you don’t condone.

“Jamie’s very sorry for hitting your son. Isn’t he?” Jamie looks at you with his mouth dropped in surprise. You don’t want to have to deal with an angry mother any more than you have to so an apology is in order. The insistent look on your face makes him bite the inside of his cheek.

“Fine. Sorry.” Aaron looks a little smug until his mother nudges him too. He lets out a short breath.

“I’m sorry too. I guess.”

“You should be.” Jamie snaps.

“Anyway.” You intercept before another argument starts. “Is that all or—”

“For Aaron yes. You two can go.” The principle gestures towards Aaron and his mother and they stand and leave the office. Once they’re gone, that just leaves you and Jamie.

“Is he in trouble?” You ask and the principle nods.

“I’m sorry, Mrs. Hollis-Karnstein. As you know,” Unfortunately you do. “Our school has a zero violence policy. And I already made an exception earlier this year.”

“Isn’t there anything you can do? Like in school suspension or something?”

“We tried that last time and here we are again. I have no choice but to suspend your son for three days.” Jamie has enough sense to look ashamed and you press your lips together.

“Alright.”

* * *

 

 **“So why exactly made** you decide to punch this kid in the face?” You ask as you’re driving Jamie home. You’d cleaned up his bloody nose and he’s slouching in the seat beside you.

“He was talking bad about you and Marm.” You glance at him and he’s looking up at you with sad brown eyes that immediately make you drop any anger you have about this situation. “He said you and Marm were sinners and that you didn’t deserve to have kids because you’d chosen your lifestyle. He said I shouldn’t have been born. So I punched him in the eye.”

“Why didn’t you tell someone instead?”

“Because I can handle things. Talking to adults doesn’t help, they just tell you to be the bigger person. And I can’t do that. No one talks bad about you guys. Or me.” You glance at him from the corner of your eyes and see tears forming in his. So you reach across and squeeze one of his fists in yours.

“I understand. Okay? It sucks. You shouldn't have to deal with that.” He perks up a bit. “But you don’t solve it by punching people. Violence only leads to more violence. Alright?”

“Okay.” He’s still frowning though, so you ruffle his hair until he laughs and swats your hand away.

When you get home, Jamie immediately sits down on the couch and pulls out a couple folders from his backpack and starts going through his schoolwork. You’re glad you don’t have to tell him even though you’re not necessarily mad at him, this suspension isn’t off time.

You leave him alone in the living room and collapse into your bed. You’re now working on a morning show along with the night show you were already doing. And you were producing the noon show, but had to have someone take over for you today when you’d been called into Jamie’s school.

You still have to go in later and tonight was one of the nights when Jamie came in with you and stayed at your desk to entertain himself while you were on air. Carmilla was so, so busy all the time with her own work even though you still saw her often enough, but she hadn’t been able to come in when the call had come.

You sit up and call her, she answers after the first ring much to your delight.

“How’d it go?” She asks and you sigh.

“He got suspended.”

“Fuck.”

“I know.” You pull the tie from your hair and let your bun fall down messily on your shoulders. “It was because of homophobic comments again.”

“Jesus Christ. I didn’t know we were still in the 20th century.” Carmilla scoffs and you smile to yourself. “Is he okay?”

“He’s fine, I think. Just bothered about everything. He doesn’t deserve this. The baggage.”

“It’s not our faults or his fault that people are so closed minded. It’s life, right?”

“I guess so. Can you talk to him when you get home? I don’t like that he’s fighting all the time. It’s not healthy.”

“Of course.” There’s a pause and then she continues. “Are _you_ okay?”

“Me? Yeah. I’m fine. Totally fine.”

“Laura.”

“Okay no. I’m not fine. I’m pissed. There’s no way Aaron came up with that himself which means someone he knows said something. And it’s not like Jamie is fighting the entire student body. It’s always him. I don’t understand why he has to antagonize _our_ son.”

“Laura, I understand where you’re coming from. If I could, I’d put Jamie in a bubble and keep him away from anything toxic. But we can’t. Unless you want to try homeschooling?”

“No, no. I did that and I ended up not having many friends until college.”

“Wasn’t that your fault?”

“ _No._ There were just… Safety concerns.”

“Right.” She snorts. “Look, don’t worry about it, cupcake. Just take him for some ice cream or something and go to work. I’ll be there to talk to him when you get back.”

“Okay. I love you.”

“I love you too. Bye.”

“Bye.” You pull the phone away from your ear as Carmilla hangs up and slide it back into your jacket. Then you stand back up and comb your fingers through your hair.

“Hey.” Jamie looks up at you and you smile. “How does ice cream sound?”

The smile that lights up his face warms your heart. Jamie was a good kid. If only you could convince him to use his words instead of his fists.

* * *

 

 **When you get home,** Carmilla is sitting at the kitchen table going through some papers. Within the past two years, she’d had to get glasses because she was getting older and her vision wasn’t so great anymore. The upside is that she looked _really_ cute in them. She turns to you when you’re locking the door.

“Hey.” She sets down her pen and takes off her glasses to rub the bridge of her nose, then she stands to walk towards you and Jamie, slipping her glasses back onto her face.

“Hey.” You reply as she ruffles Jamie’s hair and presses a kiss to your temple.

“Hi Marm.” Jamie says.

“I heard you got suspended, kiddo.” Jamie immediately looks at you with betrayal.

“You told her?”

“Of course I told her. You think she’d figure your three day suspension was just a vacation?” Jamie crosses his arms but Carmilla crouches down so they’re eyelevel and you leave them to get something to drink from the fridge.

“What have I told you about fighting?”

“Don’t get caught?” You choke on your juice and Carmilla laughs.

“No the other thing.”

“It doesn’t solve anything.” Jamie says after a moment.

“Exactly. Did punching that kid make you feel any better?”

“Not really…” Jamie admits and you clear your throat as quietly as you can manage before you take another sip of your juice.

“You’ve got to stop talking with your fists. Okay?”

“Okay.”

“Promise me.”

“I promise.” You smile to yourself at that because you could always trust Carmilla with this sort of thing. You’re more suited for academic help, while Carmilla was better at behavioral. You’re not too good at enforcing rules, you were too soft for it. One pout and you’d give in.

When it came down to it, it was effective to play to your strengths.

* * *

 

 **Later that night when** you’re lying in bed with Carmilla, feeling content and a little sticky with sweat after an amazing round of sex. Who knew that even after all these years, you still weren’t tired of how great her touch made you feel. Carmilla has her nose pressed into your neck and you stroke up and down her arm lazily when you find yourself thinking of your son already sleep in his room.

“You know he gets the violence from you.” You say and she snorts, pressing a kiss to your collarbone.

“Whatever. That temper is all Hollis.”

“I know.” A beat passes before you start talking again. “Remember when he was small and his punches were all accidental?”

“I remember coming home and finding you with a black eye.” She mumbles.

“It was an _accident_.” You repeat. “Now Jamie’s on a conquest to defend his mothers’ honor.”

“How nobel.”

“I just—I can’t really be too mad at him for it. But he got _suspended_ for it.”

“He promised not to do it again.”

“That’s what he said last time.” Carmilla props herself up on an elbow and meets your eye. She presses kisses to your frowning lips until you smile. Then she gives you a lingering kiss before she leans back on her elbow.

“He’ll learn. He’s just hitting his teens so he’s making our lives a little more difficult. It’s nothing we can’t handle.”

“Sure.” Her free hand slides to your jaw and she pulls you in to kiss her again.

“Are you still going to see your dad tomorrow?” She asks when she pulls away and you nod. “Do you want me to go in a little later and come with you?”

“No, that’s okay. I’ll be fine.”

“Okay. Just—If you need me I’m a call away.”

“Thank you, Carm.” Carmilla kisses the corner of your mouth, then your lips.

“Of course.”

* * *

 

 **It had happened three** years ago but your heart still felt raw at your loss. Every time you stood in front of his grave it felt like you were ripping open a fresh wound. You’d cried on the way in hopes of not crying in front of him for once but you’re clenching your flowers probably too hard in your hands and biting your bottom lip in an attempt to keep it together.

“Dammit.” You breathe and you wipe a stray tear roughly with the heel of your palm. “I told myself I wasn’t going to cry this time. I was going to be your strong little girl. And I cursed too. I’m already messing this up.” The spring air feels weirdly cool right now and you lick your lips.

“I just—It’s been three years and I still miss you so much. I feel like I didn’t appreciate you enough. And I—I know you’d say, ‘Laura don’t be silly.’ But I just—I really wish you were here.” Your voice breaks and you hug your flowers to your chest. You look over to your mother’s grave beside him. “At least you guys have each other now, right? I just wish you’d gotten to meet Jamie, Mom.

“He’s such a sweetheart. I mean, he’s a bit of a troublemaker but he’s got good intentions I think. And Carmilla, I know I tell you this every time I come here but she’s so wonderful and I wish you two had gotten to meet each other. I don’t know what I’d do without them. They both mean so much to me.” You phone buzzes in your pocket then and you pull it out. It’s a message from your bosses. You were needed at the station for an impromptu story.

“Crap. Looks like I have to go. I’ll be back to visit you guys soon. I promise.” You distribute your flowers evenly between their graves and stand up straight.

“Bye Dad, Mom. I love you both.”

* * *

 

 **You wipe your eyes** when you get back to your car and sit down in the driver’s seat. You couldn’t expect to drive with tears filling your eyes. You check the time your phone to make sure you aren’t late and spend a moment looking at the picture of you, Carmilla and Jamie at Niagra Falls that’s your lockscreen. Jamie’s holding up a peace sign and smiling, you’re standing behind Jamie with your arms wrapped around his shoulders and Carmilla has an arm over your shoulders with the ghost of a grin on her lips.

You think maybe it’s okay your mom and dad aren’t around anymore. You miss them both a lot. And you’d love it if they were still around. But you had Jamie and Carmilla.

And they’re all you really need in the world.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The end! This series has been in the works since November 2014 and it's kind of a blessing to bring it to a close. No promises but there is chance I might get inspired and add things. But no promises on that. I can't be trusted with things like that.
> 
> Anyway, thank you to everyone who's been patient with me during my two month hiatus from this when I was working on the PA AU. Also if you'd like to keep up with me as a writer and not just this series I've posted something new that you can find in my works.
> 
> Again thank you for sticking with me! I appreciate every single one of you so much. And I'll stop talking before I get gross and sappy. <3


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